3 Potential Cap Casualties

Big chain reaction coming if they happen

Author

Ian Hartitz
February 16, 2026

The NFL's "legal tampering" period is a mere three weeks away. The de facto beginning of free agency will produce new homes for big names across the league, changing our collective LIVES, or at least fantasy football plans, as we know them.

However, football fans might not have to even wait that long for big-time transactions to begin: Every year, there are a handful of surprising salary-cap-based cuts that happen around this time. And judging from some of the current possibilities, this year's crop of cap casualties has the potential to be THE biggest names hitting the open market.

Let's make like a rock and roll through three of the biggest potential cut candidates who have the potential to shake up free agency in a major way.

Colts WR Michael Pittman

  • Contract: Colts would save $24 million and take on $5 million in dead money by releasing Pittman.

Pittman has averaged 89 receptions for 950 yards and 5 touchdowns during his last five seasons. The 28-year-old veteran is certifiably #good—especially when not pulling a Mike Tyson and playing through a broken back like he did in 2024.

Note that Pittman was actually averaging an even more solid 13.9 PPR points per game through Week 14 last season before old man Philip Rivers took over.

That said, Indy is presumably lining up to make Daniel Jones a very rich man, and the team's leading receiver over the past two seasons, Alec Pierce, is also ready to add some zeroes to his bank account. The Colts are a better team with Pittman than without—but are they willing to deploy one of the league's most expensive WR rooms inside an offense that already heavily leans on RB Jonathan Taylor and TE Tyler Warren?

Packers RB Josh Jacobs

  • Contract: Packers would save $11.4 million and take on $3.125 million in dead money with a post-June 1 release.

Releasing Jacobs is something that seems unlikely. After all, the 28-year-old veteran has racked up 2,882 total yards and scored 30 touchdowns in 32 games wearing dark green and gold over the past two seasons.

Then again, Green Bay is in the red when it comes to available 2026 cap space, and some of Jacobs' efficiency numbers (37th in rushing yards over expected per carry in 2025) don't exactly live up to the top-5 RB expectations that go hand-in-hand with his big-money contract.

Subtracting Jacobs from the Packers would open up a potential three-down workhorse role inside an offense that has scored the league's eighth-most points since Matt LaFleur took over back in 2019. Anyone entrusted with that sort of job would, at worst, be in the position's high-end RB2 conversation in fantasy land.

Bills TE Dawson Knox

  • Contract: Bills would save $12 million and take on $5.07 million in dead money with a post-June 1 release.

If the Bills decide to move on from Knox's contract, then rising fourth-year TE Dalton Kincaid would finally have the opportunity to assume a full-time role in this ever-potent Josh Allen-led attack—with the blessing of those pesky injury gods, of course.

But yeah, a legit full-time role for Kincaid could be borderline erotic for fantasy purposes if he manages to maintain last season's ridiculous per-route efficiency.

While it's risky business to assume high-end efficiency will keep on keeping on with a major uptick in volume, Kincaid would profile as the Bills' top-target earner with the benefit of a full-time role—something that would instantly make him a potential top-5 option at the position in 2026 drafts.

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Fantasy

Fantasy Football Roundtable: Who’s Moving Up And Down In The Rankings?

Who doesn’t love post-Super Bowl rankings? Not us. Give us all of the rankings. We want to see how high up the players who had late-season surges. We want to see if there are early discounts on players coming off down years. While some casual players may see these rankings as throwing darts, if you’re reading this newsletter, you know the value in seeing where players are placed next to one another.

So we sat down with our own rankings team—Dwain McFarland, Kendall Valenzuela, Matthew Freedman and Ian Hartitz—to chat about their early rankings in this roundtable. Freedman took a swipe at how to rank rookies, even before the combine and NFL Draft:

Every time I make and then update rankings, I try to make them as functional as possible. So if there are players I like relative to the market, I want to be "aggressive" with them—but it doesn't take much to be aggressive.

Example: I'm currently the highest in our rankings on rookie Jeremiyah Love, whom I expect to go in Round 1 of the NFL Draft (probably in the top 12). I have him as my No. 7 RB. No one else at Fantasy Life has him higher than No. 9. Could I have been more aggressive and moved him up to No. 5? Yeah, I could've done that, just to make a point. But why? I'm already saying that I like him with my ranking. That's enough. Anything more than that—before we know his athletic testing, draft capital and NFL team—is overkill.

Check out this great discussion, as you get a peek behind the curtain in the rankings space.⤵️

NFL

Minnesota Vikings Team Needs: Settle QB Situation

So much has been made of the Vikings’ decision to move on from Sam Darnold after a stellar 2024 in favor of unproven J.J. McCarthy coming off a knee injury that knocked him out of his rookie season. McCarthy was injured again and the performance when he played was uneven at best. Whatever happened to that Darnold guy? Kidding.

Now what do the Vikings do at the most important position in football? Ian Hartitz continues his team needs series by going to Minnesota and taking a hard look at “Nine.”

The hesitation to keep McCarthy in the starting job is understandable. While the artist known as "nine" played better down the stretch, McCarthy was still objectively one of the worst quarterbacks in the league last season.

  • McCarthy was one of just eight quarterbacks to complete under 60% of his passes.

  • His 60.1 PFF passing grade ranked 36th among 43 qualified QBs, just ahead of Geno Smith.

  • McCarthy, Shedeur Sanders and Brady Cook were the NFL's only three signal-callers with a passer rating south of 75.

The Vikings will address this and other needs that Ian covers in his breakdown.⤵️

Fantasy

Around the Watercooler

Enjoy the end of your three-day weekend with some fun football chatter!

🏈 It’s never too early to rank the RBs. Who’s after Bijan?

🤔 ICYMI: How will the new coaches affect your fantasy team? So many new faces in new places.

🍋 This Lemon is worth the squeeze. Definite target for Dynasty.

👀 Who are T-Mac’s favorite WRs? Pretty amazing group.

❤️ Belated Valentine’s Day wishes from cooterdoodle. Speaking of parades.

👀 Travis Hunter is expected to play more CB than WR in 2026. Adjust the ranks!

🤗 Do NOT mess with Drew Brees' huddle. Great story.

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