INDIANAPOLIS — Baltimore Ravens general manager Eric DeCosta typically says little about contract negotiations with players. He sees no benefit in making those details public, particularly when talks are at a critical stage and key decisions are near.

Right on cue, his news conference on Tuesday during Day 1 of the NFL Scouting Combine started with a classic DeCosta non-update when asked about contract negotiations with star quarterback Lamar Jackson. DeCosta reminded everyone that he and Jackson have an agreement to keep their talks “in-house.”

That response made what he said about contract negotiations with pending Ravens free-agent center Tyler Linderbaum several minutes later even more notable.

“We’ve had conversations since the end of the season, and at this point in time, we’ve made him a market-setting offer, and hopefully we can get something done with him between now and the start of the new league year,” DeCosta said.

The key words in that quote are obviously “market-setting offer.”

So now we know the Ravens have not only been in contract talks with Linderbaum, but they have extended the 25-year-old an offer that would make him the highest-paid center in football, a distinction currently held by Kansas City Chiefs’ Creed Humphrey ($18 million per year, $35 million fully guaranteed).

The first part of that is hardly surprising. Linderbaum is the team’s top free agent, and the Ravens don’t easily allow homegrown talents in their prime to exit the building. The only surprising thing about the second part is that DeCosta publicly revealed it.

Tuesday’s start to the combine comes at a critical time for the Ravens and everyone else. While talks between teams and the representatives of pending free agents surely take place here in downtown restaurants, hotels and bars, they technically aren’t allowed to begin until March 9, the first day of the two-day legal tampering period.

That means the Ravens now have less than two weeks remaining in their exclusive negotiating window with Linderbaum, the standout center who has made the Pro Bowl three times in four seasons and would be one of the league’s most coveted free agents if he reaches the open market.

If you are in the camp that the Ravens simply can’t allow Linderbaum to leave, an outcome that would add significantly to an already daunting offseason offensive line build, then it’s probably time to start getting nervous. Each day closer to March 9 increases the chances that Linderbaum will be playing his football elsewhere in 2026.

“First of all, Tyler is a guy that I have tremendous respect for,” DeCosta said. “Obviously, he’s proven to be, in my opinion, the best center in the league. We’ve been having conversations.”

DeCosta said the Ravens probably wouldn’t use the franchise or transition tags to keep Linderbaum off the free-agent market, meaning an extension is a must. And it’s clear the Ravens haven’t made enough progress on that front for DeCosta to feel really good about where things currently stand.

Because if they had, there’s no way DeCosta would have stood behind a microphone Tuesday morning and told everyone the Ravens have offered to make Linderbaum the NFL’s highest-paid center.

DeCosta is very media savvy, and he says nothing by accident. Uncharacteristically providing details of the offer to Linderbaum serves only two purposes for the Ravens.

One, it applies some pressure on Linderbaum and his veteran agent, Neil Cornrich, to come to the bargaining table or at least respond to Baltimore’s offer. Two, it sends a message to the team’s players and fans that the Ravens are trying to keep the popular Linderbaum, and if they can’t, it won’t be because of a lack of effort.

Meanwhile, teams around the league continue to monitor the situation and prepare for their own run at Linderbaum if he indeed becomes available. The laundry list of teams that could use a starting center or an upgrade over their current one includes the Los Angeles Chargers, Detroit Lions, Buffalo Bills, Las Vegas Raiders and Cleveland Browns. It wouldn’t be surprising, either, if New York Giants head coach John Harbaugh looks to reunite with his former player.

In a market with a ton of teams with money to spend and not an abundance of high-level talent to spend it on, the no-frills Linderbaum could soon become the belle of the free-agent ball.

“I love my job, but if I could switch jobs for the next couple of months, I’d want to be Tyler Linderbaum’s agent,” Daniel Jeremiah, the NFL Network lead draft analyst and former Ravens scout, recently said on a pre-combine conference call. “Everybody I’ve talked to seems to be in on Tyler Linderbaum. It seems like he’s going to have a real robust market.”

DeCosta, who typically has a good read on the free-agent market, surely knows that. He also surely knows that if Linderbaum gets to the open market, the Ravens probably won’t be able to compete. It’s possible, if not probable, that Linderbaum could get north of $20 million per year on this market.

That would be an extremely difficult check to write for the Ravens, who have a litany of needs and a contract situation with Jackson that needs to be worked out. That Linderbaum is coming off an uneven year by his standards and struggles at times as a pass blocker only adds to the difficulty of the Ravens’ decision when it comes to how high they’ll go in order to keep their starting center.

But the alternative isn’t easy to accept. The Ravens already need to upgrade at both starting guard spots. Losing Linderbaum would mean three spots to fill, along with the departure of a highly respected team leader who has been durable and accountable.

“I think he is the best center in the league,” Ravens head coach Jesse Minter said Tuesday. “I think he’s one of the best interior linemen in the league. He’s a major part of the team here, somebody we’d love to have back. The rules are what they are as far as your contract and earning free agency, so I respect all that. I think he knows how we feel about him and that we’d love to have him back.

“I think he’s a major piece of our offense. I think he fits really well into the direction our offense is headed, but I certainly respect the idea of free agency as well.”

In other news from Day 1 of the combine, DeCosta and Minter continued to praise the number of conversations they’ve had with Jackson over the last month.

“I have spoken to Lamar about a lot of different things over the last month,” DeCosta said. “He’s been very engaged. He was a big value to us in the coaching search (and) we’ll continue those conversations moving forward.”

Minter said he wanted to keep the nature of his conversations with Jackson private. However, he acknowledged that he, offensive coordinator Declan Doyle and Jackson have had plenty of conversations about the state of the team and the state of the offense.

• Veteran cornerback Marlon Humphrey, a four-time Pro Bowler, is viewed as the Ravens’ highest-profile potential salary-cap cut. The 29-year-old is coming off one of his worst NFL seasons, and his $26.3 million salary-cap number is the fourth highest on the team.

DeCosta, however, said he expects Humphrey to be on the Ravens in 2026, and he doesn’t necessarily need a contract alteration to make that happen.

• Minter said he met with Nnamdi Madubuike when the veteran defensive lineman visited the team facility earlier this month, but he declined to reveal whether Madubuike is planning to return for the 2026 season.

Madubuike sustained a season-ending neck injury in Week 2, and the team has declined to update his status on multiple occasions, insisting that it’s up to the player to announce his intentions.

“I know he’s in great spirits, and it was great to see him in the building last week or the week prior,” Minter said. “We’ll keep the rest of that private.”