Colts Stand Firm, Keep Jonathan Taylor At Deadline

The Indianapolis Colts were one of the league's most active teams ahead of the NFL trade deadline, but it's the move they refused to make that created the most noise.

The 4:00 p.m. ET Tuesday deadline came and went without the Colts trading star running back Jonathan Taylor, whom the team feels is too important to have given him away for anything less than what they deemed a worthy deal.

Reports said the Colts wanted either a first-round pick for Taylor or something comparable to what the San Francisco 49ers gave the Carolina Panthers for running back Christian McCaffrey in 2022: a second, third, and fourth-round pick in 2023 and a fifth-round pick in 2024.

That offer never came, so the Colts felt no urgency to move Taylor.

The Colts fell to 2-7 last Sunday after a back-and-forth loss to the Dallas Cowboys, 27-23. While there are still eight games remaining, the Colts' record and the way in which they've achieved it, combined with the departures of former general manager Chris Ballard and significant players Quenton Nelson and DeForest Buckner, prove that the Colts' intentions are about the future. Still, they want Taylor to be part of that.

Taylor, 27, signed a new two-year, $44 million extension this offseason, putting him under contract through 2028 and about 29 years old by its expiration.

Through the first nine weeks of the season, Taylor has 161 carries for 656 yards (4.1 avg.) and eight touchdowns, plus 26 catches for 220 yards (8.5 avg.). His rushing yards rank eighth in the NFL, and his rushing touchdowns tie for sixth.

The Colts selected Taylor with the 41st overall pick in the 2020 NFL Draft, and by the end of his rookie season when he broke the franchise's single-game record for rushing yards, it was apparent he'd be a special player.

In 93 career games, Taylor has carried the ball 1,712 times for 8,254 yards (4.8 avg.) and 77 touchdowns, and has caught 213 passes for 1,689 yards (7.9 avg.) and another seven scores.

Last season, Taylor broke Edgerrin James' franchise record for rushing touchdowns (64) and is now just 973 yards short of James' franchise rushing yards record (9,226).

Along with Nelson and Buckner, the Colts have also traded the team's top two leading receivers, Keenan Allen, to the 49ers for a sixth-round pick, and Josh Downs and a seventh-round pick to the Kansas City Chiefs for a fourth- and fifth-round pick.

The Colts are now projected to have the following picks in the 2027 and 2028 drafts:

The Colts do not have a 2027 first-round pick as a result of trading for former New York Jets cornerback Sauce Gardner last season. The Colts traded their original 2027 sixth-round pick to the Buffalo Bills this summer for center Sedrick Van Pran-Granger and a seventh-round pick. The seventh-rounder is what was included in the Downs trade.