According to Eagles Insider, the Philadelphia Eagles have released DE Jason Babin. Babin has 5.5 sacks this year and finished last season with 18. There are plenty of teams out there that can use a quality pass rusher, it will be interesting to see who brings him on.
Today marked the trade deadline for the NFL and a busy day it was.
The headline story of the day, no doubt, goes to the Oakland Raiders and the Cincinnati Bengals. The Raiders acquired disgruntled QB Carson Palmer from the Bengals for the Raiders’ 2012 1st-round draft pick and a conditional 1st or 2nd-round pick in the 2013 draft. After Bengals GM, Mike Brown, swore he would not acquiesce to Palmer’s demands and deal him to any other team in the NFL, Brown finally “gave in” (if that’s what you call acquiring two 1st-picks) and the Palmer-Brown soap opera is finally over.
Acquiring Carson Palmer to lead your team- pretty good move. Giving up possibly two 1st-round picks for him- DUMB! And to think, all this time I thought it was Al Davis making all of those ludicrous personnel decisions for the Raiders. For his sake, I sure hope Palmer helps the Raiders “win baby, win.”
Later in the day, the Philadelphia Eagles dealt RB Ronnie Brown to the Detroit Lions for RB Jerome Harrison and a 7th-round draft pick (those sure seem to be a popular bargaining chip) in the 2013 draft. I like the move by the Lions because they gave up very little for a piece that can help them spread their offense and after Brown’s ridiculous attempt to pitch the ball inside the 5-yard line, I’m sure the Eagles didn’t find it too hard to let him go. They got a serviceable RB in Harrison.
*UPDATE* The Ronnie Brown to the Detroit Lions trade was voided because Philadelphia Eagles’ team doctors found that Jerome Harrison has a brain tumor. This voided trade could quite possibly save Harrison’s life.
As far as other trades go, rumors broke out in Chicago that two teams were very interested in trading for unhappy Bears’ running back Matt Forte. Forte welcomed the thought of other teams being interested in him saying “I’m glad teams are interested” in response to the Bears’ refusal to offer him a big contract. Forte’s agent was quoted as saying, “The longer they wait, the more Matt’s going to question whether he’s in their long-term plans.” Now that the trade deadline has come and gone, Forte will call Chicago home at least for the remainder of this season but Bears’ fans can’t be happy at the unrest being displayed by their electric playmaker.
Trade news isn’t all that broke today. Minnesota Vikings head coach, Leslie Frazier, has announced that QB Christian Ponder will make his very 1st NFL start this week against the defending Super Bowl Champion Green Bay Packers. Of Ponder, Frazier said, “For a guy who gets limited reps in practice, it seems he had a good grasp, like we thought he would, of our offense.”
There’s also more Bengals’ news on the day. RB Cedric Benson had his 3-game suspension, for his misdemeanor assault case that was settled before the season, reduced to 1 game (looks like Bernard Scott won’t be the hot fantasy prospect everyone thought he was). This suspension drew a lot of league-wide attention because Benson was arrested during the lockout which means he was not under a NFL contract. Regardless, the NFL and Commissioner Goodell still felt it was in their power to levy action against Benson.
The 2011 trade deadline was a busy day indeed. Now, is it Sunday yet?
