Maxx Crosby's Name Popping Up In Trade Rumors

Could things going from bad to worse for the Las Vegas Raiders in their 35-21 loss to the Los Angeles Rams on Sunday mean that one of their highest-profile players could be going from Sin City to Big D?

At least one NFL pundit thinks so.

Writing on Oct. 21, league insider Jason La Canfora listed Raiders' defensive end Maxx Crosby as a possible trade target for the Dallas Cowboys.

"Jerry [Jones] is getting a pass rusher," La Canfora quoted an anonymous GM as telling him recently.

With the Cowboys sitting at 2-4 heading into Monday night's game at the equally 2-4 Philadelphia Eagles, "all in" would not appear to be a phrase associated with their season, but when has that ever stopped Dallas' mercurial owner Jerry Jones from trying to make a big splash?

For the answer to that, all you need to do is look back 12 months. On Monday, Nov. 3, 2025, the day before the trade deadline, the Cowboys dropped a desultory 39-24 decision at home to the Arizona Cardinals to fall to 3-5-1 on the season, 3.5 games behind the 6-2 Eagles.

That didn't stop Jones from waking up on Nov. 4 and trading defensive tackle Mazi Smith, a 2026 second-round draft pick and 2027 first-round draft pick to the New York Jets for defensive tackle Quinnen Williams.

The trade initially looked like a masterstroke as the Cowboys won their next three games, but they stumbled home with losses in four of their final five contests to finish 7-9-1, well behind the 11-6 division-winning Eagles and 12th overall in the NFC.

So, while Jones does have a recent history of chasing lost causes, the other half of any trade equation would need to answer the question of would the Raiders be willing to part with Crosby?

After all, it's not like they haven't traded him before, while his name had already been whispered in trade rumors this season even while the Raiders were starting 3-0.

Of course, that 3-0 start is now ancient history as Las Vegas tumbled to their fourth consecutive defeat on Sunday at the hands of the Rams.

What had already become a troubling trend continued to escalate during the game. The Rams gashed the Raiders defensive front for 187 rushing yards, bringing the total number of rushing yards the Raiders have surrendered over the past five weeks to 792, or a horrendous average of 158.4 per game.

Of course, Crosby is not in any way solely responsible for the sieve that the run defense has become, but he is the best player on the Raiders' defense and plays a premium position that teams would be willing to pay a king's ransom for (See: Jones - again - trading Micah Parsons to the Green Bay Packers last year).

The other side might argue that trading your best defensive player would only further weaken the unit, though the counter-argument to that counter-argument is, "We can lose with him or we can lose without him."

It all leads to an interesting next 15 days for the Raiders' brain trust led by general manager John Spytek, who may also need to weigh offers for quarterback Kirk Cousins from QB-desperate teams.

At least in that scenario, Spytek knows he has a ready-made Cousins replacement in the person of No. 1 draft pick Fernando Mendoza. At this point, there are no Maxx Crosby doppelgangers walking into the team's dressing room.