With the franchise tag deadline coming up Tuesday, the Raiders made the prudent move and have tagged Josh Jacobs.
Source: The #Raiders have officially franchise tagged RB Josh Jacobs.
— Ian Rapoport (@RapSheet) March 6, 2023
The move comes as the Raiders have been attempting to sign Jacobs to a long term deal.
The 2023 tag for running backs carries a $10.9 million guaranteed salary.
With the tag number for running backs the lowest of any position on either offense or defense, it always seemed the most likely scenario that the Raiders would tag Jacobs.
This keeps Jacobs off the market. Now they have several options at their disposal.
First and foremost, it buys them more time to work on a long term deal. Something Jacobs would undoubtedly prefer to playing without guaranteed money after this season.
Should they not be able to come to terms on a long term deal, it would mean the two sides would get to see if Jacobs can repeat his success of this past season in which he led the NFL with 1653 rushing yards and over 2000 yards from scrimmage.
The other options would be to trade Jacobs. If they were to take that route, and did so prior to this year’s draft, it could yield picks this year.
Either way, we now know Jacobs will not be hitting the open market come next week when free agency opens.
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