The New England Patriots informed Diggs on Wednesday that they will release him when the new NFL league year officially begins on March 11.
According to NFL Network’s Tom Pelissero, the Patriots made the call before a $6 million roster bonus became fully guaranteed next week.
Diggs didn’t wait for anyone else to break the news.
He posted a goodbye message on Instagram thanking the Patriots organization, the fans, and his teammates for a season that took New England all the way to Super Bowl LX.
His account has since been cleared.
The decision makes sense on paper.
Diggs delivered on the field, 85 catches, 1,013 receiving yards, the first Patriots receiver to crack 1,000 yards in a single season since Julian Edelman in 2019, but his $26.5 million cap hit in 2026 was simply too steep for a player entering his age-33 season, coming off a playoff run where his production visibly dipped.
Cutting him saves New England over $16 million heading into free agency. The math was never going to work in his favor.
But the football is almost a footnote at this point. The last four months of Stefon Diggs’ life have been one of the most chaotic celebrity storylines in recent NFL memory, and anyone paying attention to the tabloids rather than the box scores could see this ending coming from a long way off.
The Cardi B Romance And How It All Fell Apart
Diggs and Cardi B went public with their relationship in May 2025, just months after she filed for divorce from Offset, the rapper she had been married to since 2017.
The relationship moved fast by any standard. By September, Cardi announced they were expecting a baby together.
Their son was born November 4, 2025.
Two days later, a paternity test confirmed that Diggs had also fathered a 7-month-old daughter named Charliee with model Aileen Lopera, a child whose existence became public at almost exactly the same moment Cardi was recovering from giving birth to their own son.
Reports noted that Diggs has six children with six different women, with four of those children born in 2025 alone.
The relationship somehow held together through the Patriots’ entire playoff run. Cardi was photographed celebrating with Diggs on the field after the AFC Championship win over the Denver Broncos in January 2026.
Days before Super Bowl LX, a reporter asked Diggs point blank whether an engagement ring was coming after the game. “It’s on the agenda, maybe,” he said, smiling for the cameras. “I gotta get mine first, though.”
The Patriots lost to the Seattle Seahawks.
Cardi left Levi’s Stadium immediately after performing during Bad Bunny’s halftime show, she never stayed to watch the end of the game.
Within hours of the final whistle, fans noticed the two had unfollowed each other on Instagram.
Entertainment Tonight confirmed the split the following day.
Sources told US Weekly the breakup had actually happened “a few days” before the Super Bowl itself, meaning Diggs played the biggest game of his career in the middle of a relationship implosion.
“He betrayed her so many times,” a source said. “Her friends have been trying to show her that he is not right for her and that she deserved better. Cardi is single and putting herself out there again. She feels free.”
A separate source told People that Cardi “couldn’t trust him” and had pulled back entirely to focus on her children, her music, and the tour she had been building for months.
Cardi On Stage, Every Night, Not Moving On Quietly
Since the split, Cardi has been on her Little Miss Drama Tour, and she has not been subtle.
At a San Francisco tour stop in late February, she delivered an on-stage rant that went immediately viral across every platform.
Without ever saying Diggs’ name, she told the crowd:
“You can’t be out here playing with a b—- like me. There’s n—– out here praying for a b—- like me. I’m too sexy to be lonely and too grown to be played with. Who you playin’ with?”
The crowd erupted. The clip went everywhere within hours.
Cardi later posted on X clarifying that she was simply introducing song lyrics and that not everything on stage is a personal shot.
The internet did not accept the explanation. The rant had already taken on a life of its own, and Diggs’ name was attached to it permanently in the pop culture conversation.
She also found herself defending him from an unexpected direction. Rapper BIA posted a pointed shot at Diggs on social media, and Cardi — despite everything, clapped back from the Los Angeles stage.
“Just because I ain’t f—— with my baby daddy doesn’t mean you get to talk about my baby daddy,” she told the crowd.
It was the kind of moment that only makes sense in this specific story, defending the man she just left, from someone else who wanted to pile on.
The Assault Charges Hanging Over Everything
Separate from the Cardi situation entirely, Diggs is facing felony strangulation and misdemeanor assault and battery charges stemming from a December 2025 incident involving his former personal chef, who alleged he slapped and attempted to choke her during a dispute over an unpaid bill.
He pleaded not guilty and has a pretrial hearing scheduled for April 1. The NFL has wide authority to issue suspensions even before legal proceedings conclude.
The Patriots publicly stated they were letting the legal process run its course, but the combination of the cap number, the age, the off-field chaos, and the legal uncertainty ultimately made the decision straightforward.
The Patriots also have bigger fish to fry this offseason, with reports linking them to a potential trade for Eagles wide receiver A.J. Brown, a move that would immediately upgrade the position Diggs is vacating.
What Happens To Diggs Now
Stefon Diggs will officially be a free agent when the league year opens March 11.
He is a proven 1,000-yard receiver who just played in a Super Bowl less than a month ago, that production is real and it will attract interest.
CBS Sports identified Denver, Dallas, and Detroit as logical landing spots before the release was confirmed, and that list will expand now that he’s officially available.
But any team signing him is also signing on to the assault charges with a pretrial hearing weeks away, the ongoing public soap opera of the Cardi B breakup playing out nightly at sold-out arenas across the country, and a player entering his age-33 season whose postseason numbers were a warning sign.
Four catches per game in the playoffs, on a team that needed him most, is not the trend line you want to be buying.
His Instagram goodbye to the Patriots was warm, professional, and gracious. His personal life heading into free agency is none of those things.
