There are winners and losers in every NFL offseason, but it's rare the biggest loser is quite as clear as the Jacksonville Jaguars this year.

The Jags and new head coach Doug Pederson desperately needed a good free agency period to improve on last season's 3-14 record, but have gotten the opposite so far. General manager Trent Baalke, who had the “interim” tag on his title lifted in January after taking over for David Caldwell midway through 2021, has had a terrible start to his time in Jacksonville, spending the team's cap space on players that either aren't all that good or just aren't that important.

Let's start with the obvious. Baalke and the Jaguars signing wide receiver Christian Kirk to a four-year, $72 million contract is flat-out ridiculous.

Kirk has never surpassed 1,000 yards in a season, and he's never been the best receiver on his team. At best, Kirk is a speedy, decent third receiver. The Jaguars decided to make him one of the highest-paid receivers in the NFL anyway. It was a completely head-scratching decision from Baalke that will almost certainly look like a terrible signing within a couple of seasons.

But the Jaguars didn't stop there. They also went out and signed wide receiver Zay Jones, a player who has never been able to provide consistent, starting-level play to a three year, $24 million deal. For some perspective, the Los Angeles Rams paid that exact figure over three years to center Brian Allen, a top-three center in the NFL.

Jones is wildly inconsistent, and when he plays his best he still isn't very good. The signing itself just doesn't make any sense either. The Jaguars just paid Kirk, and they have Laviska Shenault Jr. and Marvin Jones on the roster. Why pay Jones big money to ride the bench?

Making this signing even worse is the fact that former Jaguar DJ Chark was allowed to leave. Chark is a young receiver with tons of potential, but Jacksonville didn't bother to re-sign him. Instead, they signed Jones and Kirk for far more money.

Those signings were Jacksonville's worst, but their other moves don't make a ton of sense either.

The Jags decided to bring in linebacker Foye Oluokun on a three-year, $45 million deal. While the rest of the league moves away from paying inside linebackers big money, the Jaguars continue that outdated status quo. Oluokun is a good player, but it just doesn't make sense to pay him that much. Oluokon's is far from Jacksonville's worst contract, but it still isn't any good.

Overall, this has been a massively disappointing offseason for the Jags. They entered free agency with a ton of money to spend on improving the team, and left with a bunch of mediocre players and Brandon Scherff. After woefully mismanaging cap space, it's fair to say Jacksonville hasn't improved much on either side of the ball. Kirk and Jones aren't significant additions to the offense, and Oluokun is replacing the recently released Myles Jack.

This year's free agency period has been a huge blown opportunity for the Jaguars, and it will show on the field come September.