Raiders trading Maxx Crosby to Ravens for 2 first-round picks: Sources

The Las Vegas Raiders have agreed to trade star pass rusher Maxx Crosby to the Baltimore Ravens in a blockbuster deal just before free agency begins, league sources tell The Athletic.

The Ravens will send the Raiders two first-round picks: No. 14 in the 2026 NFL Draft next month and their selection in 2027. The deal, which is contingent on Crosby passing a physical in Baltimore, cannot be made official until the new league year opens Wednesday. Free agency effectively begins at noon ET Monday, when the legal tampering window opens.

The Dallas Cowboys and Jacksonville Jaguars also made significant pushes this week to acquire Crosby, before the Ravens closed the deal, league sources said.

Crosby, a five-time Pro Bowler, was selected by the then-Oakland Raiders in the fourth round of the 2019 draft but developed into the face of the franchise and one of the league’s best defensive players. He will now join a Ravens team that struggled mightily to impact the quarterback last year, providing an elite pass rusher as new head coach Jesse Minter works to turn around a traditionally strong defense.

That the Ravens, a draft-and-develop team that doesn’t part with picks easily, would be willing to sacrifice prime draft assets for a veteran player shows the level of urgency with which general manager Eric DeCosta is operating after last year’s disappointing 8-9 season led to the firing of longtime head coach John Harbaugh. It also reflects how badly team officials want to fix a defense that took a significant step back last season.

Crosby, who turns 29 in August, had long said he wanted “to be a Raider for life,” and he signed two huge contract extensions with the team in the last five years. Yet, his relationship with the franchise soured after the Raiders put him on injured reserve with two games left in the 2025 season, citing a knee injury. There was speculation that the move was made to help lock up the No. 1 draft pick. Crosby wanted to keep playing and left the team facility frustrated, then returned days later. He did wind up needing a minor surgical procedure on his knee. The Raiders finished 3-14 and will pick first in the 2026 NFL Draft.

Crosby has 69.5 sacks and 133 tackles for loss in his seven years with the Raiders, but has only made one playoff appearance. The Raiders have gone through five head coaches over that span.

The three-year, $106.5 million contract extension that Crosby signed last March was loaded with guarantees but not a signing bonus; the Raiders could trade him with a salary-cap charge of only $5.1 million. He has four years and $115.8 million remaining on his deal, which runs through 2029.

Raiders general manager John Spytek said during the NFL Scouting Combine last month that he expected Crosby to remain with the team in 2026.

“Maxx is an elite player,” Spytek said then. “I’ve been very up front from the start when I got here that we’re in the business of having really good players on the team, and we need a lot more of them. It’s hard to build a great team without elite players. … Maxx and I have a great relationship. He’s in the building every day, getting healthy right now. We talk on the phone, we text. I have a great relationship with Maxx.”

Pete Carroll was fired as the team’s coach on Jan. 5, and the Raiders may now be facing a full-scale rebuild, including the departure of their star player, who has missed seven games the last two seasons after playing almost every snap the previous three.

Crosby has remained publicly silent about the possibility of being moved, telling Colin Cowherd in early February that he had learned he “can’t control everything” and was focused on rehabbing from his eighth surgery in seven years.

“I’m getting healthy. I’m in the building every single day,” he said in an interview from the team facility. “I’m in this building from 6 a.m. when it’s dark out, and I’m here until almost 2. … That’s all I care about, so all the noise, that’s news to me sometimes.”

At the news conference announcing Carroll’s firing, Spytek was asked if the team considers Crosby untouchable in trade talks.

“I have a lot of respect for Maxx and how much he loves to play the game,” Spytek said. “I think it’s been well documented that he didn’t love the idea of not playing football, and I think you always want that from your best players. In fact, that’s why they’re your best players. So, I love Maxx. He embodies what a Raider is. I’ve been pretty upfront about that from the day I sat up here almost a year ago, and I continue to believe that.”

For the final question of Spytek’s news conference at the combine, he was again asked whether he considers Crosby untradeable or would listen to offers. Spytek chuckled and said, “We’re always listening, man.”

The Raiders have made the playoffs just twice since their last Super Bowl appearance following the 2002 season. They haven’t won a playoff game since 2003. Newly hired Klint Kubiak is the franchise’s third head coach in as many seasons and its fifth full-time head coach since it relocated to Las Vegas in 2020.

Meanwhile, Baltimore has executed some significant trades for veteran players in its history, landing the likes of Anquan Boldin, Roquan Smith, Calais Campbell and Marcus Peters. However, the Ravens had never traded a first-round pick for a veteran player. Now, they’ll enter a draft without a first-round pick for the first time since 2004, when they didn’t have a selection because they traded it during the 2003 draft to get in position to select quarterback Kyle Boller. They also traded out of the first round in 2010 and 2012.

Crosby had 10 sacks in 15 games last season, his fourth time in seven seasons hitting double digits. He has never had fewer than 7.5 in a season.

The Ravens finished with just 30 sacks last year, third-fewest in the league, ahead of the New York Jets (26) and San Francisco 49ers (20). Their sacks leader, nose tackle Travis Jones, had five.

Outside linebackers Kyle Van Noy, Dre’Mont Jones and David Ojabo are eligible for free agency, meaning that adding more at the edge rush spot was one of DeCosta’s offseason priorities. The arrival of Minter, who likes two-high safety positioning, which puts pressure on the pass rush to get home, made it even more important for the Ravens to upgrade their pass rush this offseason.

Enter Crosby. He now heads an edge rush group that includes 2025 second-round pick Mike Green, who had 3.5 sacks as a rookie; Tavius Robinson, who had 4.5 sacks last year in 10 games; and 2024 third-round pick Adisa Isaac, who has played just four games in his first two NFL seasons because of injuries.

With Crosby acquired, the Ravens can focus on their other needs, including bolstering the offensive and defensive lines and the secondary. However, they have fewer assets and much less salary-cap space to address their needs.