The value of the Stefon Diggs trade and what it means for the Steelers

A potential Steeler trade for a WR has it’s first relevant cost info

The Steelers are one of several teams linked via rumors to a trade for 49ers WR Brandon Aiyuk or a different veteran WR. It’s hard to discern whether the smoke from these rumors comes from a fire, a smokescreen, or just the pungent exhaled air of the rumor mill during speculation season. If there is a trade in the works, let’s see what the most recent WR trade tells us about the value given up in such a move.

If you read the headlines, you saw that the recent trade of Stefon Diggs procured a 2nd round pick for the Buffalo Bills. If you read deeper you learned that it was a future 2nd rounder. The totality of the trade is that the Bills traded Diggs plus a 2025 5th plus their current 6th (No.189) to the Texans for a 2025 2nd-round pick. It’s a very muddled trade to understand on its surface, but using a draft pick trade calculator can boil it down to a more understandable approximate value.

I’ve written about draft pick trade charts and calculators in the past and analyzed historical trades to verify their accuracy. No trade will be dead-on equal value for both teams, but these charts are fairly reliable. In terms of the Diggs trade, it’s impossible to know what number to assign to the picks from 2025 that were traded. We know that No.59 belongs to the Texans this year, but where they will draft next year won’t be known until the 2024 season is history.

The Texans could suffer a horrendous string of injuries that leads them to the worst record and the top pick in each round, or they could win the Super Bowl and get the last pick in each round. For this reason, a future pick is valued as the middle pick from one round lower in the current year, so the value of that 2025 2nd is the same as the middle pick from 2024’s 3rd round—pick No.80. Similarly, that future 5th involved in this trade can be plugged into a trade calculator as the middle pick in this year’s 6th round—pick No.176. After converting future picks, the trade now is valued as Diggs plus No.189 plus No.176 (the future 5th) going to Houston for pick No.80 (the future 2nd).

As the trade calculator doesn’t know the value of Stefon Diggs, we use the trade charts to see what pick we can substitute for Diggs to balance the trade. No.88 balances this trade so, in effect, Diggs was traded for the value of a late 3rd round pick.

Knowing Diggs’ trade value doesn’t tell us with certainty what the cost of Aiyuk, Justin Jefferson, Tee Higgins, Terry McLaurin, or any other WR would be. No two players hold equal value on the field. No two contracts acquired would hold the same value either. In the case of Diggs, he had three years left on his Buffalo contract, but the day after the trade Houston ripped it up and turned it into a one-year deal at $22.5 million.

The approximate value of pick No.88 got the Texans a one-year rental on a WR who will turn 31 this season. That info can be used as a benchmark for the Steelers when deciding whether to pursue any of the other rumored-to-be-available WRs. The Steelers certainly don’t appear to be a team where a one-year rental makes any sense, but who knows if another team is desperate to move off of a contract and ends up panic-selling a quality player at a severe discount. As he is with virtually every move he makes, I expect Omar Khan to be patient and see if the asking price on any potential WR trade comes down as we get closer to the draft.