The Eagles continue to stay aggressive in the trade market, even attacking for a rare Saturday acquisition. The latest move sees them send a 2026 sixth-round pick to the Ravens in exchange for cornerback Jaire Alexander and a 2027 seventh-rounder, per Adam Schefter of ESPN. A team announcement of the trade further reports that safety Marcus Epps and outside linebacker Azeez Ojulari have been placed on injured reserve. 
Alexander was considered one of the league’s more intriguing free agents this offseason after the Packers were unable to work out a trade agreement anywhere and released the veteran corner to the open market. In the days following his release, there were a few reports of teams who weren’t interested in pursuing Alexander, but after eight days of free agency, he landed in Baltimore with his former college teammate, Lamar Jackson.
After seeing injuries keep him out of over half of the past two seasons, Alexander was dealing with a knee issue in Baltimore’s training camp, but he found his way off the injury report in time to debut in Week 1 of the season. Alexander had an extremely poor showing against Josh Allen and the Bills, and the Ravens reacted by making him a healthy scratch for the next three games. He was active again in Baltimore’s Week 5 home blowout at the hands of the Texans and again the following week against the Rams, but he didn’t see the field in Week 6. After the team’s bye week, Alexander was made a healthy inactive for their last two games.
There doesn’t appear to be any bad blood between Alexander and the Ravens. In fact, according to Jeff Zrebiec of The Athletic, Baltimore has “raved about how well he’s handled (his benching), how hard he’s worked to stay ready.” Ultimately, despite his desire to play, the Ravens didn’t have an immediate path to playing time for the veteran.
Today’s trade will provide that opportunity to Alexander while relieving the Ravens of $2MM of cap space. Zrebiec points out that the extra sixth-rounder, which originally belonged to the Broncos, gives Baltimore eight picks for the 2026 NFL Draft, and there’s an expectation the team could receive as many as three compensatory picks, as well. With additional cap space and a bevy of theoretical draft picks, the Ravens are well set up to continue their own pursuits in the trade market.
For the Eagles, this is their eighth trade since the beginning of August, and two of the others also included the acquisition of cornerbacks. Trades rarely ever occur on Saturdays, with game prep normally dominating the schedule, but the stars aligned for this deal to happen. With the Eagles on a bye week and the Ravens coming off a victory Thursday night, both staffs have an advantage that 26 other teams don’t get to enjoy — the Dolphins (Thursday night) and the Browns, Jets, and Buccaneers (bye) also get this advantage.
Despite Philadelphia’s secondary housing two of the NFL’s stronger cornerbacks in Quinyon Mitchell and Cooper DeJean, the team’s depth at the position has been sorely lacking. The lack of depth provides a clear road for Alexander to get onto the field, and the Eagles are willing to roll the dice on Alexander’s injury history and his struggles in Baltimore, as long as it takes a bit of stress off Mitchell and DeJean. The move also reunites Alexander with passing game coordinator and defensive backs coach Christian Parker, whose first NFL job came as a Packers defensive quality control coach working with defensive backs in Alexander’s second and third years in the league.
While Epps has mostly played on special teams this year, losing Ojulari hurts an already ailing position group. We detailed yesterday how the Eagles could be focusing on addressing the pass rush before the deadline, and with Ojulari landing on IR, it becomes much more likely that Philadelphia will stay aggressive in the trade market.
Wait. Jaire Alexander was on the Ravens?
Haha he lost them Game 1 with lazy effort and penalties hasn’t played since.
Maybe, just maybe he wasnt 100% healthy.
He hasn’t been healthy for like 3 yrs so maybe, maybe that is the norm now.
On the Ravens bench most of the season, yes.
Howie Szn strikes again
Jared is not even 30 and has fallen off. His knees are bad, maybe Philly pass rush will help him as he won’t be needing to cover on deep routes often.
cant wait for monday week 10 when he comes back to gb and gets torched
That seems unnecessarily harsh. Did he steal your partner?
Oh wow
So interesting.
I was believing Ravens had life again.
Mostly bc I don’t believe in Pittsburgh, and now Flacco is hurt .
hopefully his old coach will help reignite his career .. worth a six rounder to see if can be the next howie reclamation project
I like the move. It’s a low risk high ceiling play. If it works great, if it doesn’t..he can’t really be much worse than the other corners we’ve been running out not named Mitchell or DeJean.
It’s the sort of dart throw which could pay decent dividends for us. As much as I love Kelee for what he did at the collegiate level, he’s too much of a liability playing opposite Quinyon.
Eagles are smart. Howie is upgrading there second team players. Both Cater & Alexander are upgrades over there current bench depth.
Now go get a real edge Dog to create faster pressure.