With the first Monday after the draft now in the past, it’s time to take a look at where OTC’s projection for the next slate of compensatory picks stands. If you have any questions about how this projection is generated, please take a look at the cancellation charts for all 32 teams here, and also refer to OTC’s compensatory formula page as a reference for where certain contracts are ranked. Also note that special compensatory picks generated from 2020 Resolution JC-2A are separate from the regular compensatory pick formula and thus are not addressed here.

This list is dominated by two teams, and the list is underrating that domination due to the limit of one team being awarded a maximum of four compensatory picks per draft. Those teams are the Philadelphia Eagles and San Francisco 49ers, who each saw a total of nine compensatory free agents depart for other teams.

In the case of the Eagles, they didn’t even make a single signing that would qualify for compensatory free agent status, even though they had five free opportunities to do so without going down below four comp picks. As far as I know, the net loss of nine CFAs is a record for greatest net loss ever. This should net the Eagles a 3rd, a 5th, a borderline 5th/6th, and a 6th.

The 49ers on the other hand did make a few CFA signings, including a big one away from the Eagles in landing Javon Hargrave. However, despite those signing the 49ers may end up having the same level of comp picks as the Eagles: a 3rd, 5th, 6th, and 6th. San Francisco will also get a fifth comp pick in the 3rd round not listed here for the twin departures of Ran Carthon and DeMeco Ryans to other teams.

Two other notable teams have made this list that don’t usually earn compensatory picks.

The first is the Jacksonville Jaguars, who will break what is far and away the longest active drought of being awarded compensatory picks, with 2010 being the last one in which they got one. The Jaguars normally don’t get comp picks because they have regularly been a team that spends very heavily in unrestricted free agency, and the regularity comes about due to most of those signings not working out. But 2022’s big spending was a positive exception, and as such the Jaguars made a considerable pullback from free agency this offseason, and it should net them at least 3rd and 6th round comp picks, and perhaps a 7th rounder or two if those picks that are currently out of the 32 pick limit make it in later.

The second is the New York Jets, who have only been awarded one comp pick since 2015. Now, the Jets aren’t getting great comp picks–a borderline 6th/7th, and two 7ths that could miss the 32 pick limit if snap counts don’t go in their favor. But I wonder whether the Jets were even actively pursuing comp picks at all, and instead were in a bit of a holding pattern as they negotiated with the Packers in trading for Aaron Rodgers. Since the trade happened just before the draft, it doesn’t hurt the Jets to wait a week before filling out the rest of the roster as need be now that Rodgers is in the fold.

With Buffalo also slated to get their first comp pick since 2016, a 3rd rounder for the departure of Tremaine Edmunds to Chicago that Brandon Beane appears to have mindfully earned, the team that now has the longest active drought of comp picks is the Cleveland Browns, with 2017’s pullback that got them four high comp picks being the last time.

Speaking of teams being mindful of preserving comp picks, unlike last year there were very few teams that have cancelled out high comp picks with lower level compensatory free agent signings. Most of the 3rd round cancellations were of equal value with another 3rd round valued signing–Jessie Bates III/Orlando Brown Jr. for Cincinnati, Brown/Jawaan Taylor for Kansas City, Jimmy Garoppolo/Javon Hargrave for San Francisco. About the only slightly unfortunate cancellation I can see were the Chiefs failing to see one more CFA depart, as they judged that Drue Tranquill was a worthy enough linebacker signing away from the division rival Chargers to place alongside Nick Bolton, Willie Gay, and Leo Chenal in exchange for cancelling out a third 5th round CFA departure.