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Posted on 03/03/2026 11:10:09 PM PST by nickcarraway
The Indianapolis Colts have taken the first step in ensuring that impending free agent quarterback Daniel Jones sticks around, placing the seldom-used transition tag on the veteran.
The tag guarantees the Colts the right of first refusal for Jones, preserving the right to match any competing offer sheet he might sign with an interested club. The news comes ahead of Tuesday's deadline to assess franchise or transition tags on players who are scheduled to hit free agency next week.
If Jones does not sign a competing offer sheet, he would earn a one-year guaranteed salary of $37.833 million.
Colts general manager Chris Ballard said last week that contract talks with Jones and another key free agent, receiver Alec Pierce, were proceeding well. He called the franchise tag (and, presumably, the transition tag) "a tool we have. It's not what we want to do, though."
He added, "When both sides are driven to get it done, it usually works out in the right way."
While the franchise tag often is used multiple times each year, the transition tag is used with much less frequency. No quarterback has been tagged with the transition tag since ESPN Research began tracking such moves in 2000. Only 20 players have been given the transition tag since then (though several were rescinded), with safety Kyle Dugger in 2024 being the most recent.
Most often, players reach a deal with their team after being tagged. Only four players have played an entire season under the transition tag since 2000, with running back Kenyan Drake in 2020 being the latest.
Jones resurrected his career with the Colts in 2025, leading Indianapolis to new heights with its record-setting offensive performance during the first half of the season. Through 10 weeks, when the Colts were 8-2, Jones led the NFL in passing yards and was in the top six in completion percentage and yards per attempt. But a hairline fibula fracture in his left leg negatively impacted his performance in the following weeks, with Jones sustaining a season-ending ruptured Achilles in his right leg in Week 14.
That injury has perhaps complicated negotiations with Jones, who has several months of rehabilitation remaining before he is cleared to return to the field.
Meanwhile, the decision to tag Jones has a direct impact on Pierce, who now is on pace to reach unrestricted free agency as arguably the top available wide receiver if he is not re-signed before March 11. Pierce's representatives and those of other impending free agents can begin negotiating with other clubs Monday.
With the Dallas Cowboys electing to use the franchise tag on receiver George Pickens, Pierce is likely to draw even more interest. The NFL's leader in yards per catch in each of the past two seasons, Pierce eclipsed 1,000 receiving yards for the first time in 2025 despite ranking fourth among Colts players in targets.
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Absurd money for anyone. I would just once like to see a one year breakdown of the NFL money. As a common man I just can’t wrap my head around how it is possible to carry such payrolls and all of the other costs associated with NFL and it supposedly makes huge $ for the owners and Goodell? Just see credit/debit/balance ...the money is staggering to me
Buy tickets for a family of 4.
Then they get a share of TV money. Plus gambling money and season tickets, yada yada. Dude these guys are playing their best years away and they and fans pay the bills. The owners rake it in as do the NFL. BOHICA brother and bring your own lube. Otherwise the owners will use sand.
Gambling money?
Well, if the owners are making more and more money, should any of it be shared by the players?
Just to give you some perspective, this past year each NFL team received a little over 400 million from TV contracts before selling one ticket to a game. With 32 NFL teams that means the total TV revenue number is well over 12 billion a year.
The NFL salary cap for the upcoming season has been raised to a little over 300 million, with a 53 man roster the average salary per player in the NFL is 6 million.
The NFL far exceeds all the other professional sports in terms TV revenue and fan interest.
You don’t think the NFL is getting money from FanDuel and the rest of them you are pretty naive.
I thought you were talking about the fans
They better NOT be making any “gambling money”. That would be super duper unethical and illegal as all hell. What are you talking about?
FanDuel and the rest of them doesn’t have to pay the NFL one damn dime. Where the heck are you even getting that?
All that money comes with the price of using one’s body up at a ridiculously young age, to be plagued with pain and health issues no amount of money can assuage. Add in usually shortened lifespan, having to live one’s productive years mostly away from home and family while peer-pressured to maintain a money-eating lifestyle - not forgetting the agent and “posse” get their cut too.
Now we wonder with all the sports betting if they also sacrifice whats left of their sportsmanship, joy of competing and very souls for a fixed outcome.
Nope, they can have all that with no envy from me.
I think they should give money back to the city they play in rather then taxing the residence for the stadium.
Be nice not to play in a sh!t hole town.
Baseball players make more.
It was either this or 4 times that amount for a contract extension.
The NFL exceeds all other sports in TV revenue because it’s the biggest legal con game in America today. A football game is basically 12-15 minutes of activity buried in 3+ hours of advertising and other pointless nonsense.
exactly....
You can’t trade trannies.
That’s true, but they play 162 games and for the most part every game is on some type of regional television. Plus, only 25 players are on an MLB roster versus 53 on an NFL roster.
The other thing that favors baseball is their contracts are guaranteed whereas NFL contracts for the most part are not guaranteed.
In the end, the NFL is by far larger in terms of revenue and fan interested compared to all other sports in the USA.
That may be true, but fans can’t get enough of it. The on major factor that has always favored football for fans is gambling, football is the easiest sport to understand in terms of betting, combined with fantasy football and office pools, the NFL is the king of gambling in the USA.
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