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"JAGUARS NOT INTERESTED IN TRADING BRIAN THOMAS JR." · Duval Daily: A Jacksonville Jaguars Podcast

• 0:00
  [SPEAKER_00]: Jacksonville, Jaguar, Spain's welcome in to do Vault Daily, presented by Genjac.com.
• 0:03
  [SPEAKER_00]: I'm Jordan Luger, thanks so much for being here Tuesday.
• 0:05
  [SPEAKER_00]: March 10th not much going on with the Jaguar today.
• 0:07
  [SPEAKER_00]: They did restructure Robert Hainesy, saving about $4 million in cap space, but other than that, no real news today to speak of other than Adam Shepter, ESPN NFL Reporter, one of the biggest reporters on the planet.
• 0:24
  [SPEAKER_00]: Going on Pat McFee and saying,
• 0:26
  [SPEAKER_00]: The Jack Wars are not interested in trading Brian Thomas Jr. We'll dive into that.
• 0:32
  [SPEAKER_00]: Really appreciate you all being here.
• 0:33
  [SPEAKER_00]: If you enjoy the content, please like and subscribe.
• 0:35
  [SPEAKER_00]: And I'll just check out jingyag.com.
• 0:37
  [SPEAKER_00]: Pick up some new dooval gear like that.
• 0:39
  [SPEAKER_00]: I'm wearing right now.
• 0:41
  [SPEAKER_00]: And I'll just hit that hype button.
• 0:42
  [SPEAKER_00]: So Brian Thomas Jr. We'll talk about what's going on here.
• 0:49
  [SPEAKER_00]: Everybody from
• 0:52
  [SPEAKER_00]: the you know New York Jets media to media from fantasy people like everybody's talking about a potential Brian Thomas Jr. trade.
• 1:01
  [SPEAKER_00]: And I think it all started last year at the trade deadline when Diana Rossini made a report that you know teams were interested in trading for Brian Thomas Jr. and the Jaguars were listening.
• 1:15
  [SPEAKER_00]: The Jaguars rebuked that.
• 1:17
  [SPEAKER_00]: They said that that's not true.
• 1:19
  [SPEAKER_00]: They have no interest in trading Brian Thomas Jr. At the end of this 2025 season, when they did kind of their season wrap up with James Gladstone and Liam Cohen, they talked about moving forward with a receiving core that features Jacobi Myers, Parker Washington, and, yes, Brian Thomas Jr., right?
• 1:39
  [SPEAKER_00]: Okay, so then you look at
• 1:42
  [SPEAKER_00]: everything that's happened since then, and again, people in the New York media, fantasy folks, people in Pittsburgh, everybody's still talking about a potential BTJ, Brian Thomas Jr., BTJ trade, and I think that the interest just comes from the fact that you did have that initial report from Diana Rousini.
• 2:05
  [SPEAKER_00]: The fact that teams are just curious, teams are floating like the idea like, well, maybe the Jaguars don't want BTJ because they do have the emergence of Parker Washington and they did add Jacobi Mars and they have Travis Hunter and Britain's strange is a good receiving Titan and BTJ didn't have his best season in year two and 2025.
• 2:23
  [SPEAKER_00]: I don't really know the answer.
• 2:26
  [SPEAKER_00]: I'm just like speculating on all the different things that could be causing all this interest.
• 2:30
  [SPEAKER_00]: And ultimately, I get why teams
• 2:33
  [SPEAKER_00]: why fans would be interested in BTJ.
• 2:36
  [SPEAKER_00]: He's six foot three, he's 205 pounds, he's 23 years old.
• 2:42
  [SPEAKER_00]: And he has blazing four, three speed.
• 2:46
  [SPEAKER_00]: Had an unbelievable rookie year.
• 2:49
  [SPEAKER_00]: Took a step back during his sophomore campaign, certainly.
• 2:54
  [SPEAKER_00]: But I,
• 2:56
  [SPEAKER_00]: believe he rebounded in a big way down the stretch after he came back from his injury in week 13.
• 3:02
  [SPEAKER_00]: He was no longer the focal point of the Jaguar's passing attack, but he was a piece of the Jaguar's passing attack, a part of the Jaguar's passing attack.
• 3:11
  [SPEAKER_00]: And an important part of it, right, a player that drew the opponent's number one corner.
• 3:19
  [SPEAKER_00]: player that gave the offense spacing.
• 3:22
  [SPEAKER_00]: Thanks to his vertical threat ability.
• 3:25
  [SPEAKER_00]: A guy who was no longer going over the middle of town was playing more on the vertical plane where he's more comfortable.
• 3:31
  [SPEAKER_00]: Boundary vertical type of player.
• 3:34
  [SPEAKER_00]: And I think they continue to expand that.
• 3:36
  [SPEAKER_00]: I think that he can be successful on shallow crosses, on deep overs.
• 3:42
  [SPEAKER_00]: I don't know that like the dig rat where you're probably gonna get, probably gonna get popped.
• 3:48
  [SPEAKER_00]: is going to be ideal for him, but working mostly on the vertical plane with Jacobie Myers, working more in the middle of the field, with Parker Washington working all over the field, Britain strange, all over the field.
• 4:03
  [SPEAKER_00]: This is the pathway moving forward.
• 4:06
  [SPEAKER_00]: I think he can be one of the best deep perceiving threats in the game, and I think you started to see that down the stretch again after week 13.
• 4:15
  [SPEAKER_00]: What were the issues before week 13?
• 4:17
  [SPEAKER_00]: I mean, drops for one.
• 4:19
  [SPEAKER_00]: He was leading the league in drops and leading the league in drop percentage.
• 4:24
  [SPEAKER_00]: He only had one drop after week 13.
• 4:29
  [SPEAKER_00]: And he had, I mean, we can do the math here, right?
• 4:34
  [SPEAKER_00]: He had,
• 4:36
  [SPEAKER_00]: In week 13 three targets, week 14 six targets.
• 4:39
  [SPEAKER_00]: So you got nine there, nine plus seven is week 15.
• 4:43
  [SPEAKER_00]: At seven targets against the jets, nine plus seven is 16.
• 4:48
  [SPEAKER_00]: Then he had two targets against the Broncos, so 18.
• 4:51
  [SPEAKER_00]: Then he had seven against the Colts.
• 4:55
  [SPEAKER_00]: That's 25.
• 4:56
  [SPEAKER_00]: Four against the Titans in Week 18.
• 5:00
  [SPEAKER_00]: That is 29 and two in the wildcard round.
• 5:03
  [SPEAKER_00]: That is 31.
• 5:04
  [SPEAKER_00]: 31 targets and only one drop.
• 5:07
  [SPEAKER_00]: Like the hands improved.
• 5:09
  [SPEAKER_00]: You also, again, and Week two is when you saw the big, against the Bengals just like,
• 5:15
  [SPEAKER_00]: Some plays where he just said, I ain't getting hit.
• 5:19
  [SPEAKER_00]: It's all at a couple times.
• 5:21
  [SPEAKER_00]: Maybe he was dealing with something, maybe he was dealing with injury, whatever it might be.
• 5:25
  [SPEAKER_00]: But that was his really, really bad game, but he had a bad start to the season.
• 5:30
  [SPEAKER_00]: He did.
• 5:31
  [SPEAKER_00]: I thought after he came back, he looked more comfortable with the Jaguars were more comfortable in his utilization because they had Jacobi Myers who could do a lot of the things that he was not successful in doing.
• 5:43
  [SPEAKER_00]: He started catching the ball a lot more like his overall catch percentage and 2025 was 55 percent.
• 5:52
  [SPEAKER_00]: But it was like 63 percent following week 13 following his comeback.
• 5:58
  [SPEAKER_00]: It got better and his yards per catch was also excellent after week 13.
• 6:05
  [SPEAKER_00]: We can pull up the full numbers here.
• 6:09
  [SPEAKER_00]: And all this to say is, I think the Jaguars are, especially when you look around the league, Alec Pierce getting $29 million or $285 or whatever it is, Romeo Dobson, and Juan Del Robinson are getting like $20 million per year.
• 6:26
  [SPEAKER_00]: Look, I think BTJ on his cost-controlled contract, even if he is just the guy.
• 6:33
  [SPEAKER_00]: for spacing, for vertical plane, for taking away the opponent's number one corner.
• 6:38
  [SPEAKER_00]: Even if that's his primary role moving forward, that's valuable.
• 6:44
  [SPEAKER_00]: I mean, that is incredibly valuable.
• 6:46
  [SPEAKER_00]: But I think that there's more to one lock, and I think if there are a couple of those deep passes from Trevor Lawrence to Ryan Thomas Jr. go a little bit differently.
• 6:54
  [SPEAKER_00]: Also, when you're talking about a season that looks a lot different.
• 7:01
  [SPEAKER_00]: We'll do pulling up the stats from just week 13 on for Brian Thomas Jr.
• 7:15
  [SPEAKER_00]: He had 31 targets, like I mentioned.
• 7:32
  [SPEAKER_00]: 20 catches, 64.5% catch rate was averaging over 15 yards per catch, had two touchdowns.
• 7:40
  [SPEAKER_00]: He was playing better football, like much, much better football than he was earlier in the year.
• 7:46
  [SPEAKER_00]: And if you extrapolate those numbers, just those numbers over the course of a season, you have seven games.
• 7:54
  [SPEAKER_00]: So he was averaging
• 7:59
  [SPEAKER_00]: 20 he had 20 catches divide that by seven to 0.85 catches per game.
• 8:04
  [SPEAKER_00]: That's not huge numbers.
• 8:05
  [SPEAKER_00]: That's not.
• 8:06
  [SPEAKER_00]: But that's like 50 catches for a full 17 game season.
• 8:16
  [SPEAKER_00]: 308 yards divided by seven.
• 8:20
  [SPEAKER_00]: That's 750 yards.
• 8:24
  [SPEAKER_00]: If you're talking about him getting 750 yards
• 8:29
  [SPEAKER_00]: Parker Washington get in around 800 yards.
• 8:31
  [SPEAKER_00]: Jacobi Myers get in around 800 yards, Britain strange getting around 500, 600 yards.
• 8:37
  [SPEAKER_00]: Running backs also adding to that and other ancillary pieces, that's a passing game that is well balanced, that is well rounded.
• 8:45
  [SPEAKER_00]: And that's just if he plays the way he did at the end of last year.
• 8:49
  [SPEAKER_00]: I think there's a lot more to unlock.
• 8:52
  [SPEAKER_00]: Based on what we saw in college, based on what we saw during his rookie season in which he had 1,300 receiving yards
• 9:01
  [SPEAKER_00]: I understand why the Jaguars don't want to trade him.
• 9:04
  [SPEAKER_00]: And from my perspective, early on right after the season was ending, and there was still talk about this, I was like, well, I might take a second round pick, like a good second round pick.
• 9:18
  [SPEAKER_00]: I kind of moved more towards, it's going to be a first round pick for me.
• 9:23
  [SPEAKER_00]: And look, maybe the Jaguars by saying we're not interested in trading him are just trying to get that
• 9:30
  [SPEAKER_00]: get that a return a little bit higher.
• 9:32
  [SPEAKER_00]: Maybe they are, I'm not saying they're not doing that, I'm not saying they are doing that.
• 9:36
  [SPEAKER_00]: They could be negotiating through the media a little bit, right?
• 9:41
  [SPEAKER_00]: But they could also just be like, hey, this guy's valuable to our offense, we value his skill set.
• 9:50
  [SPEAKER_00]: We think we can get a lot more out of him than we got out of him in 2025.
• 9:56
  [SPEAKER_00]: and he's cost-controlled for 2026, 2027.
• 10:01
  [SPEAKER_00]: They can use the 50-year option because he was a first-round pick in 2028.
• 10:06
  [SPEAKER_00]: I mean, they've got him, they can lock him up for three more years without having to really spend big.
• 10:13
  [SPEAKER_00]: The 50-year option will be a little pricey, right?
• 10:15
  [SPEAKER_00]: But not pricey the way.
• 10:19
  [SPEAKER_00]: a, you know, top of the line, why do you super contract will be?
• 10:23
  [SPEAKER_00]: We don't know what he'll be at that point.
• 10:24
  [SPEAKER_00]: We don't know what he'll look like in two years.
• 10:27
  [SPEAKER_00]: This could be a blip, a sophomore slump for Brian Thomas Jr.
• 10:32
  [SPEAKER_00]: I know I believed like heck in him and I believed a lot more on what I saw towards the end of the season than what I did at the beginning.
• 10:39
  [SPEAKER_00]: So maybe the jacks can figure this thing out with Brian Thomas Jr. And he can be a, at the very least what he was at the end of last year,
• 10:51
  [SPEAKER_00]: an absolutely dynamic weapon that you can target a lot.
• 10:58
  [SPEAKER_00]: So I'm happy to hear Adam Shepter going on McAfee and trying to put this thing to bed.
• 11:03
  [SPEAKER_00]: I don't think it will go to bed.
• 11:05
  [SPEAKER_00]: I think people will continue to talk about it.
• 11:10
  [SPEAKER_00]: But everybody locally who has plugged in has been talking about the Jaguar is not being interested in trading Brian Thomas Jr.
• 11:20
  [SPEAKER_00]: I've not heard anything about the Jaguar is actually being interested in trading Brian Thomas Jr.
• 11:26
  [SPEAKER_00]: The team themselves, when they've been asked about it, have said they're not interested in trading Brian Thomas Jr. Maybe they just don't want to trade them.
• 11:33
  [SPEAKER_00]: And I'd be good with that.
• 11:35
  [SPEAKER_00]: I'd be very good with that.
• 11:36
  [SPEAKER_00]: Let me know how you're feeling about this situation in the comment section below.
• 11:39
  [SPEAKER_00]: If you enjoy the content, please like and subscribe.
• 11:42
  [SPEAKER_00]: Y'all have a good one.