NFL Draft: Since Jacksonville signed Christian Kirk, the wide receiver market has turned gaga

A suddenly distorted wide receiver market – thanks, Jacksonville! – turned a position once considered an NFL draft afterthought into the focal point of Thursday’s first round

Fri, 29 Apr, 2022 - 11:55

Oliver Connolly

What happens when the league’s tragicomedy franchise hands a market-resetting contract to a middling receiver? Lunacy. Absolute lunacy.

The stench of the four-year, $72m deal that the Jaguars handed to Christian Kirk in the opening hours of free agency last month wafted through Las Vegas during the first round of the NFL draft on Thursday. Someday soon, we’ll look back on the Kirk signing as the first domino that injected chaos into the NFL’s carefully calibrated ecosystem – a sliding doors moment that will swing divisional races, title games and that most vapid of terms: Legacies.