A trade that would have sent five-time Pro Bowl edge rusher Maxx Crosby to the Baltimore Ravens fell through at the final hour, leaving the NFL stunned and sparking uncertainty about where the Las Vegas Raiders star would play his football in 2026. After months of trade buzz and the near completion of a deal, signs point to Crosby sticking with the Raiders after all.
Crosby expressed his apparent commitment to the Raiders in a social media post.
“Everything Happens For A Reason,” Crosby said. “Believe Nothing You Hear & Half Of What You See. Im A Raider. I’m Back. Run That Sh*t. 🦅🏴☠️”
Those first comments in the wake of the Ravens backing out of the trade over medical concerns are a stark contrast to Crosby’s words earlier in the week. When the news surfaced that the teams had agreed to terms on a trade, Crosby posted a 13-minute video on social media bidding goodbye to Las Vegas.
That farewell message has since been deleted.
Crosby’s reported discontent with the Raiders, particularly with regard to their handling of his knee injury at the end of last season, was the crux of the trade chatter from the start. The Raiders shut him down for the final two games of the campaign as he awaited a meniscus trim, and he did not take kindly to them prohibiting him from finishing out the year before undergoing the procedure.
Until the Raiders reached an agreement with the Ravens to move Crosby, they had never definitively made it clear they wanted to pull the plug on their biggest defensive standout. Now that the deal is off, they may be inclined to keep him in house for the foreseeable future and work on mending any frays that remain in their relationship with the two-time All-Pro.
If Crosby’s failed medical with the Ravens reduces the Raiders’ leverage in future trades, and if the team-player relationship is tenable, there is little incentive for Las Vegas to part ways with their biggest defensive standout.
The Raiders are loading up on both impact players and draft capital in this next stage of their rebuild, so bringing Crosby back into the fold for good makes sense for a team that may not be all that far away from taking a step forward. They signed center Tyler Linderbaum — the No. 1 free agent in Pete Prisco’s top 100 rankings — and stocked up on defensive help with the likes of cornerback Taron Johnson, edge rusher Kwity Paye and linebackers Quay Walker and Nakobe Dean. And projected No. 1 overall pick Fernando Mendoza is right around the corner.
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