The lone member of the Indianapolis Colts’ 2025 draft class who remains unsigned at this point is second-round pick and defensive end JT Tuimoloau.
While the other seven members of the Colts‘ draft class all inked their deals prior to rookie minicamp, it’s not alarming, nor should it be a surprise, that Tuimoloau still hasn’t been signed. In fact, most of the second-round selections league-wide haven’t officially signed their rookie deals yet.
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The rookie wage scale puts a ceiling and floor in place for how much a player can earn on their first contract, and those figures are dependent upon where they are selected. This makes the opportunity for negotiating relatively limited.
However, the negotiations that do take place are often centered around how much of the deal is guaranteed. The contracts of first-round draft picks are fully guaranteed now, but as it pertains to second-round selections, a larger portion of these contracts are becoming guaranteed each offseason, which then leads to more negotiating that takes place.
This year, the first two picks in the second round, Cleveland’s Carson Schwesinger and Houston’s Jayden Higgins, had both of their contracts fully guaranteed. So the 35th overall pick and so on are likely looking to match, or at least a large portion of their contract guaranteed.
Typically, the draft picks before a player is selected lay the framework for what the next selection’s contract will look like. With picks 35 through 44 unsigned, some of those dominoes may have to fall first to lay the groundwork for Tuimoloau, who was the 45th overall pick.
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In terms of the deal getting done, there is nothing to worry about, and there really isn’t any set timeline. For a reference point, it wasn’t until June that the Colts and 2024 second-round pick AD Mitchell agreed to a deal last offseason.
This article originally appeared on Colts Wire: Why JT Tuimoloau is Indianapolis Colts last unsigned draft pick