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By Zack Rosenblatt, Dianna Russini and Brooks Kubena
The Philadelphia Eagles are trading pass rusher Haason Reddick to the New York Jets, league sources confirmed. The Jets are sending the Eagles a conditional 2026 third-round pick that can become a second in exchange for Reddick.
ESPN was the first to report the news.
Reddick has spent the past two seasons with the Eagles as one of their best defensive players. He was a Pro Bowler in both years and a second-team All-Pro in 2022, as he helped Philadelphia to a Super Bowl appearance.
The 29-year-old has recorded double-digit sacks in his past four seasons, including 11 in 2023.
“All kinds of juice and gas off the edge,” said Jets coach Robert Saleh on Reddick before the Eagles-Jets game during the 2023 season. “He’s definitely a problem.”
Reddick signed a three-year, $45 million deal with the Eagles, his hometown team, in 2022. The 2024 season will be the final year of that contract.
The Eagles finished this past season 11-6, but five of those losses came in their final six regular-season games. Philadelphia’s defense in particular struggled, ranking 26th in total yards allowed.
Why this move was surprising
This one comes as a major surprise — especially since the Jets had a 25-year-old Bryce Huff in the building and let him walk in free agency … to sign with the Eagles. Reddick is a much more proven commodity than Huff, of course, and has been one of the most productive pass rushers in the NFL over the last four years, getting 50 1/2 combined with 83 quarterback hits.
The Jets clearly view him as a more complete pass rusher than Huff at this stage — otherwise, they wouldn’t have invested so much in draft capital (a conditional 2026 third-round pick that can become a second) and money (a $14.5 million cap hit in 2024 on the last year of his deal) to find Huff’s replacement. But once the Jets lost Huff, it became clear that finding a veteran edge rusher to add to their rotation was a priority.
They pursued Jadeveon Clowney before he signed a two-year deal with the Panthers, even hosting him for a visit. They tried signing Shaquil Barrett before he landed with the Dolphins, too. Eventually, they settled on trading for the disgruntled Reddick, who has been seeking a new contract after his performance the last few years. — Zack Rosenblatt, Jets beat writer
How this impacts the Jets defense
The Jets only had $9.6 million in cap space before this trade, per Over the Cap, so they’ll likely have to restructure some contracts to clear more space to both fit Reddick into their cap sheet and to have enough room to operate the rest of the offseason.
The Jets defensive end room all of a sudden looks loaded again, though it does beg the question of how much the organization believes in the ability of 2023 first-round pick Will McDonald, who was expected to take on a bigger role in 2024 once Huff left in free agency. Instead, McDonald will fall fourth in the pecking order behind starters Jermaine Johnson (a Pro Bowler), John Franklin-Myers and now Reddick. This move also will allow the Jets to focus on positions of greater need in the NFL Draft, like at wide receiver and on the offensive line. — Rosenblatt
The Eagles defense gets younger
This is an expected result for the Eagles and Reddick, although the trade includes a surprising destination. General manager Howie Roseman completed the deal within the deadline he created by moving Reddick’s $1 million roster bonus from March 15 to April 1. After declining to offer any comments on Reddick during the NFL’s league meetings earlier this week, the patience Roseman projected in handling Reddick paid off rather quickly.
The Eagles have now effectively gotten younger at edge rusher while also gaining extra draft capital for the future. Roseman signed Bryce Huff to a three-year, $51.1 million deal to give the franchise more options, and now the Eagles are banking that the 25-year-old pass rusher will give them higher upside than Reddick who wanted a new deal entering the final year of his contract. — Brooks Kubena, Eagles beat writer
What Huff brings to the Eagles
The pathway is now clear for Huff, who held a pass-rush specialist role with the Jets, to increase his snap share with the Eagles. He recorded 10 sacks and 10 tackles for loss while playing just 42 percent of the defense’s overall snaps in 2023. The Eagles would’ve had a potential logjam if Reddick had remained on the roster. Now, Huff fits well within a group that includes Josh Sweat and 2023 first-round pick Nolan Smith.
This move includes a gamble. Reddick was a proven pass-rusher, a two-time Pro Bowler who amassed 27 sacks in two seasons. He was their best defensive player in that span, and there’ll be an expectation for Huff to at the very least maintain Reddick’s productivity.
Eagles coach Nick Sirianni said at league meetings that the coaching staff, including newly hired defensive coordinator Vic Fangio, knows “how good of a pass rusher (Huff) is.” Jets coach Robert Saleh told The Athletic that “the sky’s the limit for that dude.”
“As a pass rusher, he’s elite and he’s been trending in the right direction consistently,” Saleh said. “He’s working on his ability to stop the run, and I think he will.” — Kubena
Required reading
(Photo: Harry How / Getty Images)
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