{"id":536689,"date":"2026-03-13T00:59:13","date_gmt":"2026-03-13T00:59:13","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/536689\/"},"modified":"2026-03-13T00:59:13","modified_gmt":"2026-03-13T00:59:13","slug":"nfl-free-agency-arizona-cardinals-bring-back-ol-elijah-wilkinson","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/536689\/","title":{"rendered":"NFL free agency: Arizona Cardinals bring back OL Elijah Wilkinson"},"content":{"rendered":"

The Arizona Cardinals<\/a> have signed a player who could possibly be their starting right tackle in 2026. In a move that went unreported before the Cardinals announced it, the team sigend offensive lineman Elijah Wilkinson to a two-year contract.<\/p>\n

It is Wilkinson’s second stint with the team. He was the Cardinals’ starting left guard in 2023 and re-signed in 2024 but did not make the team.<\/p>\n

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Last season, he started all 17 games and played all 1,060 offensive snaps for the Atlanta Falcons at right tackle.<\/p>\n

The 6-6, 310-lb versatile lineman is now 31 years old. He has started 62 games in his career at guard and tackle in his career.<\/p>\n

He started his career in 2017 and played four seasons for the Denver Broncos, followed by a season with the Chicago Bears, one in Atlanta, one Arizona and the last two back with the Falcons.<\/p>\n

He projects as a starter for the Cardinals, either at right tackle or at right guard. His signing creates some flexibility moving forward. He could be the Cardinals’ starting right tackle this coming season. He could also, if the Cardinals use a high draft pick on a tackle, start at guard.<\/p>\n

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We don’t know how much Wilkinson will make yet, but based on his being a starter last season, he likely gets a two-year deal worth between $8-12 million.<\/p>\n

Projected starting offensive line<\/p>\n

The Cardinals can field a starting offensive line, and it would be at least average, with moves in free agency.<\/p>\n

If the season started now, the Cardinals’ starting offensive line would likely look like this:<\/p>\n

Get more Cardinals<\/a> and NFL coverage from Cards<\/a> Wire’s Jess Root and others by listening to the latest on the Rise Up, See Red podcast. Subscribe on Spotify<\/a>,\u00a0YouTube<\/a>\u00a0or\u00a0Apple podcasts<\/a>.<\/p>\n

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This article originally appeared on Cards Wire: Arizona Cardinals sign free agent OL Elijah Wilkinson to two-year deal<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The Arizona Cardinals have signed a player who could possibly be their starting right tackle in 2026. In…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":536690,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[559],"tags":[1258,1276,64,63,1248,1256,263113,266172,109539,266173,593,33875,85,3750],"class_list":["post-536689","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-nfl","tag-arizona-cardinals","tag-atlanta-falcons","tag-au","tag-australia","tag-chicago-bears","tag-denver-broncos","tag-elijah-wilkinson","tag-hjalte-froholdt","tag-isaac-seumalo","tag-isaiah-adams","tag-nfl","tag-offensive-lineman","tag-sports","tag-the-cardinals"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/536689","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=536689"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/536689\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/536690"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=536689"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=536689"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=536689"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}