2024 NFL Free Agency Spending

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NFL players are now reporting to their respective team facilities for voluntary organized team activities (OTA’s). With that, the bulk free agency period is complete with teams working to finalize their draft boards. In today’s newsletter, I wanted to look at the cash spending during this free agency period across the league.

The 2024 free agency period was far more exciting than years past. The market dynamics of the NFL can wildly differ from year to year. This offseason was no different.

The defensive tackle market continued to strengthen both at the top and the middle of the market. The offensive guard market was surprisingly strong for the middle-market players. The two position groups correlate with each other to no surprise.

The runningback market came back to life based upon an expected weak draft class combined with an exploding league salary cap.

The position group that lost the most was the safety position. Teams across the league released multiple veterans creating a saturation of veteran talent in the street free-agent market. Many of those players are still available today, and may not find a team until after the draft.

So which teams were the big spenders? The table below has the team spending, and the table is sortable. Re-signing pending free agents before the start of the league year was counted as UFA’s for this exercise.

Observations:

• Washington Commanders signed the highest number of free agents at 25 players.

• Houston Texans committed the largest Year 1 cash at $120.475 million.

• Jacksonville Jaguars committed the largest total guarantee amount at $188.518 million. The Jaguars also committed the largest full guarantee amount at $177.018 million.

• Dallas Cowboys were very inactive during free agency committing a league-low $11.130 million towards free agency.

• Tennessee Titans, signing 12 contracts, had the highest average Annual Per Year amount of $8.091 million.

• The mean number of contracts signed was 14 per team.

• The mean total value contract spending was $147.339 million.

• The delta between the highest and lowest spending teams was a staggering $298 million!

Houston Texans Focus

In referencing back to my newsletter on cash spending by NFL teams (read here). In that edition, I projected the Houston Texans to spend approximately $110.0 to $120.0 million in cash in 2024 toward free agency. That number ended up being a little soft with the team eclipsing $120 million without counting the trade acquisitions of RB Joe Mixon (and his extension) and WR Stefon Diggs. It is worth noting some of the players acquired via free-agent signing will not make the final roster, lowering the free-agency cash spending amounts.

Overall I feel encouraged by the projection and the amount of cash the team is spending for the 2024 league year. The McNair family continues their aggressive payroll strategy. Houston, currently, is projected as a Top 5 cash spending organization for 2024.

If you are an avid follower of my work, you should know I am not a fan of big free agency spending. As Nick Caserio continues to build the foundation of this roster, this offseason appears to have had a more targeted approach to signing players. Seeking out trades for specific player skill sets can yield positive results versus overpaying for a free agent.

Next up…the NFL Draft! Below are the current draft slots for the Houston Texans. There is a 0% chance that the team stays in these specific slots come Day 2 of the draft.

Thank you for reading and for your continued support.

-TC