The Las Vegas Raiders made the controversial decision this week to rising star tight end Darren Waller to the New York Giants.
The Raiders’ received the Kansas City Chiefs’ third-round compensatory pick (the 100th overall selection) which will happen on Day 2 of the 2023 NFL Draft.
The Raiders announced the trade as Waller and his wife, Kelsey Plum, who plays for the WNBA’s Las Vegas Aces, returned from their honeymoon in Turks & Caicos.
The move was notable because it was Waller’s former coach, Josh McDaniels, who leaked news of Waller’s wedding while attending the 2023 NFL Combine in Indianapolis last month.
Robert Griffin III, a college football analyst with ESPN, couldn’t help but note the timing of the trade while joking that McDaniels wasn’t a romantic:
The tweet earned over 47,000 “likes” on Twitter since being posted.
One reaction was notable in that it came from Plum herself. It also sheds light on the fraught relationship between McDaniels’ and the franchise’s tight end:
Only time will tell how the trade works out for both franchises, but the trade fit the ethos of new Giants general manager Joe Schoen.
“We’re not shopping for minimum players anymore,” Schoen recently told reports. “So, even players like that that can be really good depth players will make us that much better.”