The Baltimore Ravens keep telling everyone that NFL All-Pro defensive tackle Nnamdi Madubuike will play football again.
The Ravens will wait and hope for Madubuike to return from a career-threatening neck injury that has sidelined him since Week 2 of the 2025 regular season.
Bleacher Report’s Kristopher Knox believes the Ravens should plan for a future without Madubuike — or a future with a greatly reduced role for Madubuike — by trading a conditional 7th-round pick to the Tennessee Titans in exhange for defensive lineman and former No. 3 overall pick Solomon Thomas.
“The Tennessee Titans were far more competitive in Week 2 than they were in Week 1. However, they’re still sitting at 0-2 and may soon have to recognize that they’re probably not going to the playoffs in 2026,” Knox wrote on September 23. “If and when the Titans start looking ahead to next season, they should consider moving veterans who aren’t part of the long-term picture. 30-year-old defensive lineman Solomon Thomas falls into this group. Tennessee acquired Thomas in an offseason trade, a logical move at the time, as he had previously played for new head coach Robert Saleh. However, Thomas simply hasn’t been a big piece of the defensive puzzle and has only played 28 percent of the defensive snaps through two games. Thomas could, however, help another team in 2026. He logged 27 tackles and three tackles for loss in a rotational role with the Dallas Cowboys last season.”
The Cowboys traded Thomas and a 2026 7th-round pick to the Titans in exchange for a 2026 7th-round pick – 7 spots higher — on March 11.
49ers Passed Over Patrick Mahomes for Thomas
Looking back, it was more poor scouting by the San Francisco 49ers than anything else that they decided to draft Thomas, 6-foot-2 and 285 pounds, at No. 3 overall out of Stanford in the 2017 NFL Draft.
Thomas played 4 seasons for the 49ers before spending time with the Las Vegas Raiders (2021), New York Jets (2022-2024), Cowboys and Titans.
It’s hard not to look at Thomas, all things considered, as the very worst 1st-round draft pick in 49ers history because a pair of future Pro Football Hall of Famers were taken in the next 7 picks — running back and NFL Offensive Player of the Year Christian McCaffrey to the Carolina Panthers at No. 8 overall and 3-time Super Bowl champion quarterback and 2-time NFL MVP Patrick Mahomes to the Kansas City Chiefs at No. 10 overall.
The 49ers eventually got McCaffrey, and it cost them dearly, giving up their 2nd, 3rd, and 4th-round picks in the 2023 NFL Draft and a 5th-round pick in the 2024 NFL Draft to get him from the Panthers in October 2022.
Through his 1st decade in the NFL, Thomas has approximately $44.3 million in career earnings.
Madubuike’s Status ‘Biggest Question’ for Ravens
Madubuike, when he’s healthy, has been 1 of the NFL’s elite interior defensive linemen — and 1 of the highest paid. He signed a 4-year, $98 million contract extension with the Ravens before the 2024 season.
The Ravens are 1 team with Madubuike in the fold and an entirely different team without him. He’s that good, and it doesn’t matter how the Ravens spin it; another player his caliber just isn’t available to them.
But the Ravens can adapt if they know Madubuike isn’t going to be around for another year — or ever again — after he missed 15 games in 2025 with a severe neck injury. That’s why they hired new head coach and former Los Angeles Chargers defensive coordinator Jesse Minter.
Ravens Urged to Trade for $44 Million Former No. 3 Overall Pick