If the Philadelphia Eagles want to make a blockbuster trade, they might move a rapidly diminishing asset in exchange for a 1st-round pick.
With the NFL trade deadline looming on November 10, Bleacher Report’s Kristopher Knox proposed a trade that would send either one of two NFL All-Pro cornerbacks — Cooper DeJean or Quinyon Mitchell — to the Buffalo Bills in exchange for a 2027 1st-round pick.
In DeJean’s case, with his downturn, that might end up being a 2nd-round pick. If the Eagles truly shop Mitchell, they could bring back multiple 1st-round picks.
The Bills have only $4.6 million in salary cap space left, meaning both Mitchell and DeJean on rookie contracts are doable — and both would be prime candidates for lucrative contract extensions with the Bills at season’s end.
“To be fair, there probably isn’t an available defensive back who is worth a first-round pick and who would fit into Buffalo’s cap constraints,” Knox wrote on October 31. “However, that shouldn’t stop GM Brandon Beane from taking a bold swing at a star on a rookie deal like Cooper DeJean or Quinyon Mitchell.”
Cooper DeJean Having Nightmare Season in 2026
While Mitchell remains one of the NFL’s handful of elite cover cornerbacks, DeJean might need a fresh start.
DeJean, a 2024 2nd-round pick, won a Super Bowl and became known as a hard-hitting, versatile slot cornerback as a rookie — a year capped by an interception return for a touchdown against the Kansas City Chiefs in Super Bowl LIX. In his second season in 2025, he earned his first NFL All-Pro and Pro Bowl honors.
DeJean seemed on the verge of cashing in big money with his first lucrative contract extension following the 2026 season — an extension that could have made him the NFL’s highest-paid slot cornerback.
With the Eagles reeling at 2-5 after five straight losses, DeJean’s struggles have come into sharper focus. And it’s about to hit his bottom line.
“Cooper DeJean has struggled with tackling this season,” Eagles reporter Cayden Steele wrote on his official X account. “According to PFF, he has missed 13. That was supposed to be the strength of his game. He will need to play better over the next two months to raise his contract value.”
Trade Could Improve NFL’s 31st-Ranked Defense
It’s kind of amazing the Bills are 5-1 and considered legitimate Super Bowl contenders at this point because their defense has been so terrible — they are ranked 31st in the NFL in team defense.
Nowhere are those struggles more pronounced than in the secondary, where cornerback and 2025 1st-round pick Maxwell Hairston seems like a bust, and one of their starting safeties, C.J. Gardner-Johnson, won’t even be available in Week 8 against the Baltimore Ravens as he served a 1-game NFL suspension for spitting on Las Vegas Raiders tight end Brock Bowers in Week 6.
Bills Urged to Trade 1st-Round Pick for Eagles All-Pro CB