Hours before the NFL capped trades for the reainder of the season, the Philadelphia Eagles believed they had a trade in place with the Cincinnati Bengals.
The defensive end Arnold Ebiketie was set to join the Bengals, while the Eagles would acquire more draft capital. Not even two hours later, the Bengals backed out.
The trade ended up falling through, and the Eagles were rumored to be frustrated. After that, the Eagles didn’t get another deal done.
On Wednesday (November 11), the Bengals hit the field for practice. Beforehand, Bengals head coach Zac Taylor publicly addressed the failed trade.
On behalf of the Bengals’ organization, he apologized to the Eagles.
Bengals Coach Sends Message To Eagles After Failed Trade
“Obviously, we tried something yesterday. Duke (Tobin) was very explicit with me when he came and spoke to me of how he wanted this portrayed, and I’m not comfortable doing it, but I’m gonna do what he asked,” Taylor told reporters.
“We did make an effort to put some depth in there in place of Cashius (Howell). As we got into it, obviously it was going to be a little more costly than we initially anticipated. Duke is really apologetic about it and wants to make clear Philly was a great trade partner and it was on our end, and that’s just the way things go.”
Moving forward, the Eagles have to roll with a player, who now knows they tried to trade him.
Ebiketie joined the Eagles for the 2026 NFL season on a one-year deal, with hopes of competing for a title. Instead, he landed on a team that is 2-7 at the bye, and the team attempted to cast him off for a late-round pick.
This season, Ebiketie has appeared in nine games. He registered 25 tackles, along with getting two hits on the quarterback.
Since Ebiketie will stick around after all, the Eagles ended up moving on from just one player this week–sending Jordan Davis to the Jacksonville Jaguars.
