Today in football: OH MY WORD A MYLES GARRETT TRADE. (Full details here, and more on this in a minute.)Plus: The Vikings’ new GM illustrates how you can become your favorite team’s GM. But let’s start in Philadelphia.This article is from The Athletic’s NFL newsletter. Sign up here to receive it directly in your inbox. It’s free to subscribe. A.J. Brown trade: Why the timing matteredWith the calendar flipping to June 1, the Eagles can finally trade A.J. Brown to the Patriots.First: How are we already at month six of 2026? 2025 ended a few weeks ago!Second: Yes, we got a merciful end to the Brown saga. To celebrate, Daniel Popper published a detailed explainer on why teams wait until today, the very important date of June 1, to finalize a deal. The most important thing to know:
If Brown was traded by the Eagles before 4 p.m. ET today, league rules force Philly to account for Brown’s remaining bonus money in the 2026 league year.
If they instead traded Brown after 4 p.m. today, the Eagles can divide that money over two seasons.
That’s because, as Daniel explains in his story, “for a transaction to be processed by the league on any given day, it must be submitted by 4 p.m. ET. A transaction submitted to the league at 4:01 p.m. would be processed the following day.”And since Eagles general manager Howie Roseman is fond of paying bonuses to delay salary-cap hits, Brown has $43.5 million of bonus money that would accelerate onto the team’s 2026 cap.The top row in this next graphic shows what happens if the Eagles traded Brown before 4 p.m. today, while the lower rows show the bonus money split across two seasons, if he’s moved after 4 p.m.The salary cap was undoubtably the biggest reason for its delay. Trade grades here.Another star who was moved?! Browns defensive end Myles Garrett.Cap-starved Cleveland would’ve been on the hook for all of his $41.09 million signing bonus if it officially moved him before today, but can spread that amount across two seasons by processing the trade after 4 p.m.Our Browns beat reporter Zac Jackson wrote about the possibility of the team trading the 30-year-old superstar (with just two playoff appearances in his nine-year career … #FreeMyles!). From Zac:💬 “Maybe something really could be up, and maybe with that contract modification came an acknowledgement from both sides that the Browns’ current timeline might not match Garrett’s.”I want to zoom in on that contract modification. Those things matter. For example, the Raiders structured Maxx Crosby’s contract in a way that enabled them to move on from him without significant cap damage (and they nearly did, but for those pesky Ravens’ doctors).
