On Monday, NFL insider Adam Schefter of ESPN indicated that no teams throughout the league were planning to use their franchise tags on running backs. But with the massive salary cap expansion this offseason, it sounds like the New York Giants could still decide to place a franchise tag on Saquon Barkley.
On Monday, Adam Schefter reported that the Giants were “unlikely” to use a franchise tag on Saquon Barkley given its sizeable $12,109,200 cost. But after the salary cap jumped all the way up to $255.3 million, it sounds like the Giants are reconsidering that move.
New York Giants general manager Joe Schoen told Pro Football Talk on Tuesday morning that he was not ruling out the possibility of using the franchise tag on Barkley after the cap increase.
We just talked to Giants G.M. Joe Scheon. He was pleasantly surprised to hear the cap was moving to $255.4M. He expected $243M. He did not rule out using the franchise tag on RB Saquon Barkley.
— ProFootballTalk (@ProFootballTalk) February 27, 2024
“We just talked to Giants G.M. Joe Schoen. He was pleasantly surprised to hear the cap was moving to $255.4M. He expected $243M. He did not rule out using the franchise tag on RB Saquon Barkley,” Mike Florio of Pro Football Talk wrote in a post on X, the social media website that was formerly known as Twitter.
So it sounds like there is a chance that Barkley is tagged after all. We’ll have to see what happens.