Baalke talks franchise tag, Evan Engram re-signing

Jan 26, 2023 - 3:11 PM

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Now that the Jacksonville Jaguars season is over, the team can start looking ahead to the 2023 offseason and begin planning out their roster and what moves need to be made. Jaguars general manager Trent Baalke met with the media on Wednesday and one of the first things he was asked about was if the team would utilize the franchise tag or not.

“I’m hoping we don’t need to use it,” Baalke said when asked about the tag. “Right now we’re evaluating this team as a staff. Doug (Head Coach Doug Pederson) and the rest of the coaches are going through a process, an end-of-the-season process that we’ve set up. Our personnel staff is doing the same thing. We’ll join forces tomorrow and meet for most of the morning to really put a plan in place for how we’re going to attack this offseason.”

Truthfully the Jaguars don’t have many options to actually use the tag for. The two biggest candidates are the obvious ones, tight end Evan Engram and offensive lineman Jawaan Taylor.

“Obviously, we’d love to have Evan back. Evan and I visited yesterday as he went around the building and visited with everybody. I think it’s mutual,” Baalke said when asked about Engram. “Now we have to make it happen. That’s something that we’re going to work on with Evan and all the other free agents that we have. We have a list of them that we’ve got to mow down one at a time.”

Engram set Jaguars franchise records this season and had a complete resurgence in Doug Pederson’s offense, which is exactly what he was looking for when deciding who to sign with last offseason. Engram bet on himself with a one-year deal and it’s about to pay off, hopefully with the Jaguars.