Bills RB James Cook's trade price is lower than expected

NFL trade prices can often be a bit unexpected.

That's particularly true at positions like running back, which has lost value across the league in recent years.

So in a new article by ESPN's Bill Barnwell, the discussion of James Cook's trade value maybe shouldn't be all that surprising.

Barnwell notes that Cook wouldn't be likely to return a first-round pick to Buffalo if the Bills decided to trade the star RB (and to be clear, they aren't planning to trade him).

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It certainly seems a bit unusual on the thinking that it'd be hard to find a player like Cook even with a first-round pick, so why wouldn't he garner that in return?

But contract costs and positional value have just made RB a less key position to most teams.

With that in mind, Cook actually becomes more valuable to the Bills than to anyone else. They've already got him, so why move him?

"Cook's right up there with the league's best backs when he's playing well, and he's on a relatively modest deal for a veteran runner, but his seven fumbles in 2025 color his impact," Barnwell writes. "We also haven't seen teams paying first-round picks for veteran backs in recent years, although Christian McCaffrey netted the Panthers what cumulatively amounted to a first-round pick when he was dealt for second-, third-, fourth- and fifth-round selections."

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Barnwell broke down a bunch of the Bills' players, writing that a theoretical Josh Allen trade cost would be seven first-round picks. He also puts Spencer Brown, Greg Rousseau and Ed Oliver in a group that would each be worth a single first-round pick apiece.

Cook is slotted into the category of "missing out," along with Dion Dawkins, Dalton Kincaid and Maxwell Hairston.

The Bills will gladly keep Cook, anyway. They don't need any such theoretical deals.

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