As the Denver Broncos get set to enter the important stage of the offseason known as free agency, they will be evaluating the entire roster to see where improvements can be made or future assets can be obtained.
Courtland Sutton has been a player that has shown he can be among the better receivers in the league but as a former second-round pick, he hasn't been a player that has ever lived up to that potential either.
He is still just 27 years old and he has great size at 6-foot-4, meaning there could be plenty of trade value there for other teams. Those are the players the Broncos need to identify. While it may be tough to give up on Sutton, he could provide the kind of return that gets the Broncos more picks in the upcoming draft.
If the Broncos were to make Sutton available in a trade, these four teams should be approached about what interest level they may have.
Teams that Broncos could trade Courtland Sutton to: New York Jets
We'll start this list with what may be the most obvious team, the New York Jets.
The Jets will have former Broncos head coach Nathaniel Hackett as their offensive coordinator this coming season and on Monday, the Jets hired Zach Azzanni as their wide receivers coach.
Azzanni had held that same position in Denver since 2018 and was the longest-tenured assistant on the coaching staff. That makes him the only wide receivers coach that Sutton has known.
The Jets have a young player in Garrett Wilson who was just named the NFL's Offensive Rookie of the Year. Pairing him with Sutton would give the Jets' quarterback in 2023, whoever that may be, quite the weapons to work with.
Imagine if that was Aaron Rodgers.
In this trade, the Broncos get back the second-round pick they used to get Sutton in 2018. Five years later, you can't hardly beat that.
Baltimore Ravens
The Baltimore Ravens will need to sign Lamar Jackson to a big deal this offseason or move on from him. While option two is a possibility, it doesn't seem like it would be a wise move by the organization.
While Jackson has always been instant offense, the team has never had a major weapon for him in the passing game, despite its efforts.
DeMarcus Robinson caught more passes than any wide receiver on the roster this past season but he will be an unrestricted free agent this offseason.
Rashod Bateman has had a lot of injury issues in his young career thus far and the team needs a strong option to go with tight end Mark Andrews. Sutton could be that guy, so long as he himself could stay healthy.
Sutton would be a big target in the passing game for Jackson and could take some of the pressure off of the quarterback while also helping to open the offense up.
In this trade, the Broncos would not be gaining a draft pick but they would be upgrading one of those that they already have. The sixth-round pick that they would be trading here would be the one the team received from the Pittsburgh Steelers in exchange for Malik Reed last season.
Daniel Faalele is a massive prospect and one of the biggest players in the league. The Ravens selected him in the fourth round last year but they have Morgan Moses and Patrick Mekari on the roster who can play right tackle.
The Broncos could flip Sutton for Faalele and see if they could turn the former Minnesota Golden Gophers offensive tackle into their future right tackle.
Dallas Cowboys
The Dallas Cowboys are a team that is contending and Jerry Jones is not going to watch that window close easily.
Dak Prescott is going to be the team's quarterback and CeeDee Lamb is the No.1 wide receiver. But the team does not have great options beyond him as Michael Gallup has had injury concerns and has caught less than 40 passes in each of the last two seasons.
Sutton could come in and fix that problem and it could be an ideal situation for him too as he was born in Brenham, Texas and he played his college ball at SMU. The Cowboys would also likely be a team willing to pay up to get
The Broncos would get back into the second round under this scenario as well and be able to look at some of the offensive linemen who are available there or perhaps an edge rusher in that round. There are a lot of quality rookies who the Broncos will miss out on without having any picks until the third round but this trade (or the one with the Jets) would solve that issue.
Green Bay Packers
This would be a very uncharacteristic move from what we have come to know of the Green bay Packers. The team just does not make a lot of outside-the-box moves.
But with Randall Cobb aging and an unrestricted free agent and Allen Lazard also set to hit free agency, the depth chart is going to start to get pretty thin. The team could easily move on from Cobb at this stage in his career but will likely make every effort to keep Lazard, who would be one of the bigger names on the open market.
Christian Watson looks like a future star and Romeo Doubs, another rookie last year, has some upside. But beyond them, the only other wide receivers on the roster are Samori Toure, Bo Melton and Jeff Cotton.
Sutton would be a massive upgrade and could be a prime target for Aaron Rodgers or Jordan Love, whoever is the Packers' quarterback next year.
But the Packers would also play some hardball with the Broncos and wouldn't want to give up a second-round pick. Instead, the Broncos could try and work something like this.
This would be a great return for Denver. They would get a third pick in the third round along with Kingsley Enagbare, who many analysts had a second-round draft grade on at one point last season. He slipped all the way to the fifth round, where the Packers grabbed him.
Enagbare played in all 17 games as a rookie and made seven starts, racking up 31 tackles and three sacks. The Broncos could add him to their pass-rushing corps and be satisfied with what they received in exchange for their former second-round pick, Sutton.