Jonathan Taylor Trade Talks Are Stuck on a Price Two Buyers Have Already Refused

The New York Giants offered the Indianapolis Colts a second-round pick and a fifth-round pick for Jonathan Taylor, and then they took the offer back.

The Colts want a first-round pick for Taylor, or the four-pick package the San Francisco 49ers paid for Christian McCaffrey in 2022. Nobody has offered either. The Giants’ offer — a 2027 second and a 2028 fifth, per Fox Sports’ Jay Glazer — was the only second-round offer on the table, according to NFL insider Jordan Schultz, and New York pulled it on Sunday after the Colts turned it down. The Giants beat Philadelphia 19-11 on Sunday and lead the NFC East at 5-2-1, which is why the pick is a late one. Tom Pelissero reported on Saturday that Taylor is most likely staying in Indianapolis, and that no team has come close to what the Colts want. Ian Rapoport called the state of play a standstill on Thursday: several teams interested, willing to offer a significant package, “but maybe not quite what (interim general manager) Ed Dodds… wants.” The deadline is Tuesday at 4 p.m. ET. The Jonathan Taylor trade talks have produced one documented bid, and it is gone.

Taylor’s two-year, $44 million extension carries $39 million in total guarantees, and the $15 million signing bonus is already paid, per Over The Cap’s contract page. Spotrac’s week-nine figures put what a new team owes for the rest of this season at about $5 million. After that comes $16.02 million in cash in 2027 and $17.98 million in 2028 — about $39 million for the remainder of the deal, with cap hits of $21.02 million and $22.98 million in those two years. The date that matters is February 25. That is when Taylor’s $15 million salary for 2027 becomes fully guaranteed, on the fifth day of the waiver period. After that, any buyer inherits a fully guaranteed year, and the Colts’ leverage is worth less than it is today. Trading him costs Indianapolis, too: about $10 million of the signing-bonus proration accelerates onto the 2027 cap, per ESPN’s Dan Graziano.

On October 27 the Colts traded eight-time Pro Bowl guard Quenton Nelson to Seattle for a 2027 third-round pick and a 2028 fifth, and three-time Pro Bowl defensive tackle DeForest Buckner back to San Francisco for a 2027 fourth. Buckner had asked to go. He told reporters in San Francisco that he fell to his knees and started praying when the call came, and the 49ers paid a fourth-round pick for a player they had traded to Indianapolis for the 13th overall pick in 2020 and then signed to a four-year, $84 million extension. Two captains, three Day-3 picks, one afternoon. The price the Colts are demanding for Taylor is a first-rounder, or four picks. The price they have actually taken is three picks in the third round or later.

In August 2023 Taylor asked for a trade, and the Colts wanted at least a late first-round pick. The Miami Dolphins talked, the Colts turned down at least one offer, the ask came down toward a second-round pick, and Miami walked. The Colts’ own deadline of August 29 passed with no deal, and Taylor spent the first four games of the season on the physically unable to perform list. The owner at the time, Jim Irsay, had texted Sports Illustrated that the Colts were not trading Taylor, “end of discussion.” Two months later they signed him to a three-year, $42 million extension. The owner now is Irsay’s daughter, Carlie Irsay-Gordon, who took over after her father died in May 2025. In early August she told a training-camp crowd that Taylor was “here to stay” when the extension was announced. Three months later the team is shopping him.

Taylor has not asked to be traded; he said so on October 29. “I haven’t heard anything,” he told reporters. “I’m always proud to wear the horseshoe… But obviously, circumstances may cause otherwise.” Asked again on November 5, a week after the Nelson and Buckner trades, he did not answer the question at all. “At this point, the hay is in the barn now,” he said. “We’re preparing for the Cowboys.” On Sunday he carried 13 times for 46 yards against a Dallas defense that had surrendered more than 150 rushing yards a game, and lost a fumble in the red zone at the Dallas 18 with 9:49 left, his second fumble in two weeks and his third of the year. He has 656 yards and eight touchdowns in eight games this season, after leading the league with 18 rushing touchdowns last year. The Colts lost 27-23, their fifth in a row, and fell to 2-7. Afterward, asked whether Sunday might have been his last game in Indianapolis, Taylor said he plays every game like it is his last, that Indianapolis is where he grew up, and closed with: “Just know it was a pleasure.” He did not say he wants to stay. NFL insider James Palmer reported on Thursday that Taylor expects to be traded. The Colts, meanwhile, told quarterback Daniel Jones he will not be traded before the deadline.

Minnesota’s backfield runs on Aaron Jones, who averages 4.2 yards a carry and cannot finish a game healthy, and Jordan Mason at 3.9. Denver’s beat reporter Zac Stevens says the Broncos will do everything in their power to make the deal, with RJ Harvey on injured reserve and J.K. Dobbins at 3.3 yards a carry. Green Bay’s running backs are last in the league in EPA per rush attempt, and Josh Jacobs is under an NFL investigation that could still end in a suspension. Cincinnati and Seattle have checked in. One source with a team in the mix put the odds at 50-50. The market lost a competing seller when Baltimore decided to keep Derrick Henry rather than start a rebuild, a decision the SI tracker says pushed Taylor’s price up, not down.

“I’m ok with this,” one wrote on the Colts’ Reddit page after the Giants’ offer was pulled. “You don’t need to get rid of every single player on the roster during a rebuild… We should keep him and sell off everybody else. Especially if he wants to be here.” Another wanted the trade but not the price: “JT should be traded fs but that is a trash offer. Can always trade him in the offseason.” A third, writing after the Cowboys loss, aimed at the front office over the Sauce Gardner trade: “Same people who did that are now telling you they think they can get a first for Jonathan Taylor.” And a fourth made the case for keeping him as the one bright spot: “Someone has to be a bright spot in a rebuild, and it might be Taylor for the colts.” The survey numbers lean the other way: 73 percent of respondents in SB Nation’s Colts-site survey last week said the team should trade him. The comments that draw the most agreement are the ones arguing about what he is worth, not whether he should go.

The Colts do not own a first-round pick in 2027. They sent it to the New York Jets last November for cornerback Sauce Gardner. A first-rounder back for Taylor would not be a bonus. It would be the replacement for the pick the next regime does not have. That is the other half of the standoff: the Colts say they can wait, that the offseason will bring better offers. The contract says the $15 million becomes fully guaranteed on February 25, and a buyer in March is buying a guaranteed year, not an option. Schultz reported on Sunday that the front office believes the offseason will bring better offers.

The $15 million signing bonus is already paid. The Colts paid it before the season.