Philadelphia Eagles general manager Howie Roseman doesn't have much cap space to work with entering the 2026 offseason, and even less room to create any.
Roseman has big decisions to make with Jaelan Phillips, Reed Blankenship, Nakobe Dean, and Dallas Goedert becoming free agents, but he needs more money to pay them if he wants to retain them for 2026. NFL.com's Matt Okada shared his top candidates to be cut during the offseason, with the Eagles having one candidate that makes sense: cornerback Michael Carter.
"Howie Roseman is arguably the best GM in the business, especially when it comes to value-maximized trades. So when he acquired Carter from the Jets in October, I didn’t ask questions. Here’s the issue: Carter played just 20% of the snaps after joining Philly and finished the year with a rather terrible 48.6 coverage grade from PFF (108th among 118 CBs with 250+ snaps), as well as 11.2 yards per target and a 102.7 passer rating allowed, according to Next Gen Stats. He’s a good run-defending corner, but Philly plays in a division with talented passers Dak Prescott, Jayden Daniels and Jaxson Dart (with John Harbaugh at the helm). Ultimately, the Birds can cut Carter for $8.7 million in cap space and rock with Quinyon Mitchell and Adoree' Jackson on the outside (though they’ll need to re-sign Jackson before he becomes a free agent in March) and Cooper DeJean in the slot. By all accounts, Carter should be the odd man out this offseason."
Cutting Michael Carter would dramatically help the Eagles
Let's face it: Roseman only traded for Carter in the middle of the season because Jackson and Kelee Ringo were not playing well at CB2 and made a reactionary move. Roseman himself admitted he did not do enough at cornerback last offseason and made up for it by trading for Jakorian Bennett in the preseason and for Carter and Jaire Alexander at the trade deadline. None of those moves had any impact on the team.
Carter was reduced to a special teams player and backed up DeJean the rest of the year. In eight games with the Eagles, Carter only had 10 tackles.
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The Eagles can always find another cornerback in the NFL Draft and potentially re-sign Jackson as an emergency CB2 if needed, but having Carter on the team is kind of pointless. That $8.7 million they can pick up on cap space with Carter's release is way more valuable than what he could bring to the team.