NFL free agency grades: QB Russell Wilson signs with Giants

Another big quarterback domino of 2025 NFL free agency has fallen. Quarterback Russell Wilson signed a one-year deal worth up to $21 million with the New York Giants on Tuesday night. The deal includes $10.5 million guaranteed.

Wilson, 36, threw for 2,482 yards, 16 touchdown passes and 5 interceptions last season with the Pittsburgh Steelers. And now he comes to New York even after the team added Jameis Winston to its QB room. Is this a good move for the Giants? Does it help stabilize their offense? Let's size up the deal.

Analytics writer Seth Walder is evaluating the deal based on multiple factors, including on-field impact, salary cap implications, compensation, player value/age and the context of the Giants' short- and long-term outlooks. How large is the impact of this decision and how sure are we it's a good or bad choice? We also asked NFL draft analyst Matt Miller to make sense of the deal from a draft perspective. How does the signing change draft plans for the Giants, who have been matched to Colorado's Shedeur Sanders in many mock drafts?

Here's our take on the big QB move, including a grade.

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Grading the deal | Draft spin
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Grading the deal

A few days ago, I complimented the Giants for signing Winston. I felt (at the time) it meant they were opting out of the Aaron Rodgers sweepstakes. I thought it was solid that they landed Winston for only $4 million per year. While they're surely out on Rodgers now, the second part of the Winston analysis is no longer applicable.

Getting Wilson for one year at $10.5 million (because that's what I assume the deal ultimately will be) isn't that wild in a vacuum. But who were they fighting to pay that much to Wilson? And much more importantly -- why? The Giants already have a comparable veteran bridge QB on the roster for cheap. Signing Wilson is unnecessary, spends money that could be saved for the future and does little to nothing to raise this team's ceiling. Getting Winston for cheap, plus drafting Shedeur Sanders, Jaxson Dart or another rookie QB at No. 3 overall, would have been making the most of a terrible quarterback hand. Adding Wilson costs $10.5 million and doesn't help very much.

In Wilson, the Giants get a quarterback who is in decline but still possesses a high floor. Wilson had a 51.3 QBR for the Steelers last season, which ranked 22nd among quarterbacks. (Winston ranked 19th.) It was the third consecutive season Wilson finished 21st or worse.

Injuries prevented Wilson from starting at the beginning of last season, but Pittsburgh coach Mike Tomlin made the controversial decision to switch from Justin Fields to a then-healthy Wilson in Week 7. At first, the move looked like a success -- the Steelers ripped off six wins in seven games and Wilson posted a 59 QBR in that span. But Wilson and the Steelers stumbled down the stretch. They lost their final five games -- their last four regular-season games plus a wild-card loss to the Ravens -- with Wilson posting a 36 QBR in that span.

Wilson can still uncork a vintage rainbow deep ball every so often, but he is nothing like he was half a decade ago. His accuracy has dropped, as his plus-4% completion percentage over expectation from 2016 through 2020 fell to minus-1% over the next four seasons (perhaps partially a result of losing Seattle's receivers). He throws short more often (75% of his passes were under 10 air yards last season) and his sack rates have crept up again (at least 9% in each of the past three seasons).

Maybe this move signals that the Giants don't believe in Sanders and/or don't think they can land him with the No. 3 pick. I'm not sure that justifies signing both veteran QBs, however.

There's no question Winston and a rookie would have been an extremely high-variance option. Wilson increases the Giants' chances of respectability in 2025, but there is no trophy for that. And it's not what New York should be chasing.

The saving grace is that this is not that much money for a quarterback in the grand scheme of things -- even if it was unnecessary. Either Wilson or Winston could be flipped to a contender in the event of an injury. And it means Rodgers is surely off the table. But going as cheap as possible at quarterback and hoping to strike lightning in the draft was the preferable option. -- Walder

Grade: C

What does the signing mean for the draft?

The signing of two veteran quarterbacks to one-year deals that total roughly $14.5 million in 2025 should not prevent general manager Joe Schoen and coach Brian Daboll from drafting Sanders if he's available at No. 3. Sanders' toughness and playmaking ability were on display at Colorado the past two seasons but especially in 2024, when he threw for 4,134 yards and 37 touchdown passes to 10 interceptions in leading the Buffaloes to a 9-4 record. Sanders is the most accurate passer in the this quarterback class, as evidenced by his 74.0% completion percentage this past season. He has easy ball placement and complete command of where his passes are landing.

The Giants could bring Sanders along at his own pace -- which would be important for him after not playing in a pro-style offense in college and often being allowed to ad-lib at the line of scrimmage. Learning behind Wilson and Winston for a season affords him the time to acclimate to the speed of the pro game while learning from valuable mentors how to navigate the NFL and the New York media market. Instead of thinking of Wilson's signing as a roadblock preventing the Giants from drafting Sanders, it's possible the signing was done to give Sanders the best possible support as he transitions to the NFL. -- Miller