What to Make of the Latest Brooks Trade Suggestion

The Miami Dolphins will return to the practice field at the Baptist Health Training Complex on Tuesday with their two 2025 All-Pro players still headed into a contract year.

And the case of linebacker Jordyn Brooks remains perhaps more unsettled than that of center Aaron Brewer because of two factors, his contract not having been restructured so far this offseason and his name consistently surfacing in trade speculation.

Already this offseason, Brooks' name has come up in connection with the Dallas Cowboys and most recently the Denver Broncos, and now there's a new team that's being mentioned, that team being the Cincinnati Bengals.

This one comes in the form of a hypothetical trade suggested by Bleacher Report writer Gary Davenport, who had the Dolphins sending Brooks to the Bengals in exchange for a 2027 second-round pick and a 2028 fourth-round selection.

EVALUATING THE IDEA

Brooks earned first-team All-Pro honors last season as one of the few bright spots in a very disappointing Dolphins season, and new GM Jon-Eric Sullivan has called him one of the pillars of the organization as the rebuild (our word, not the Dolphins') begins.

That Brooks' name is even mentioned in trade speculation has to do with his contract status because he's headed into the final year of the three-year contract he signed with the Dolphins as a UFA in the spring of 2024.

Brooks is scheduled to make $8.3 million in 2026 with a combination of base salary and roster bonus, and carries a cap number of $10.8 million.

After the Dolphins signed De'Von Achane to his extension last week, Brooks was asked whether he was confident he would get an extension himself and his reply of "It could go either way" certainly was eye-opening.

It also is important to remember that the cap ramifications of a Brooks trade are a lot less significant for Miami if it happens after June 1.

Brooks' age also might be a bit of a factor in the evaluation process for Miami when it comes to handing out an extension because he'll be 29 in October and the Dolphins might need a year or two before they realistically can start thinking about being playoff contenders.

THE FINE PRINT

Looking at the trade suggestion, the immediate reaction is that, wow, a second and a fourth would be a good return for Brooks, though let's remember they wouldn't get the second-round pick on the field for another year and the fourth-rounder for another two years.

Based on the draft chart, you drop a round for every year you have to wait for a pick, so the second-round pick then basically is a third-round rookie this year and the fourth-round pick would be a sixth-rounder.

All of a sudden, the trade doesn't look quite as appealing.

Trading Brooks after June 1 would give the Dolphins an additional $8.4 million of cap space, but they're getting $20 million of that regardless once the Bradley Chubb release hits the books.

And then the Dolphins have all sorts of cap space headed their way in 2027 after making all those painful sacrifices this year.

So this wouldn't be a move necessitated by the cap situation, but rather a conscious choice that two future draft picks plus that additional cap space would be more beneficial to the Dolphins than extending Brooks.

Sullivan has said he wanted to address the Brewer and Brooks contract situations at some point in the offseason, though he also has never made a definitive statement about not trading Brooks the way he did with Achane at draft time — shortly before the running back got his extension.

The bottom line is that the Dolphins very well might end up extending Brooks after all — and he certainly has earned it on and off the field — but there always will be that speck of doubt until it happens and until we're a few days into June.