Maxx Crosby trade shocker just awakened Giants' unpleasant Carlos Correa memories

On Tuesday night, the Baltimore Ravens backed out of their trade with the Las Vegas Raiders for edge rusher Maxx Crosby due to a failed physical. It shocked the NFL world, but SF Giants fans have seen this saga play out before with Carlos Correa.

It has become an inside joke amongst the fanbase at this point. Every free agent signing, trade, coaching hire, heck, even the acquisition of a theater, comes with the caveat, "Pending a physical." At least it's made for some gallows humor over the years, but now Giants fans can feel a little better as another major deal in the sports world was upended by a failed physical.

Giants fans all too familiar with failed physicals

These things aren't unheard of in professional sports. What made the Correa example so wild is that the Giants were on the hook for $350 million and then had concerns about Correa's ankle. Maybe they got cold feet and decided to back out using the physical as an excuse or maybe there were genuine concerns about his ankle.

The Giants were not the only team to back out of a deal with Correa that offseason in 2022 as the New York Mets did the same thing not long after the deal with San Francisco fell through.

Ultimately, the Giants are probably happy with how things played out. If they had committed $350 million to a player over 13 years and he went on to put up the good, but far from exceptional, numbers he's put up with the Minnesota Twins and Houston Astros in recent seasons the deal would look like a real disaster since Correa would have been under contract until 2035.

Instead, the Giants waited a bit but landed shortstop Willy Adames on a much more reasonable seven-year, $182 million deal back in 2024. Adames got off to a very rough start for the Giants last season but thankfully he turned things around and had a strong second half, becoming the first Giant since Barry Bonds in 2004 to hit 30 home runs in a season.

It also bears mentioning that the Giants probably would not have been able to land Rafael Devers in a trade last season, absorbing the massive contract he signed with the Boston Red Sox, if they had gone through with the Correa deal.

While the whole Correa episode was a bit embarrassing for the Giants at the time, we can all laugh about it now. Maybe Ravens fans will be able to do the same about Crosby someday. The fact that they have already signed premier free agent edge rusher Trey Hendrickson to a deal has to make it hurt a lot less...pending a physical of course.