Rumored as a franchise tag candidate, safety Kyle Dugger remains a priority for the Patriots, Sam Robinson of Pro Football Rumors reports. The young safety would be among the top defenders available if he reaches the open market. The Pats are trying to prevent that.

Less than a week before the deadline to apply franchise tags, MassLive.com’s Karen Guregian and Mark Daniels report the team has submitted an offer to Dugger. Absent a tag, the Pats have until 11am CT to negotiate exclusively with Dugger. At that point, unsigned players are free to speak with other teams in the tampering window.

The cap spiking to $255.4 million has made it more expensive to tag a safety; that number checks in at $17.12 million. This is considerably higher than what it took for the Bengals to keep Jessie Bates off the 2022 market ($12.9 million). That complicates matters for the Pats. The Giants are believed to be considering the lesser-used transition tag for safety Xavier McKinney; that would cost $13.82 million. A transition tag does open the door to offer sheets, as no compensation comes back to teams in the event of an unmatched offer. A franchise tag all but slams the door on a player signing elsewhere.

 Tony Pauline of Sportskeeda reports the Patriots’ Dugger offer checks in at an annual average value of $13 million. That falls well short of the cost of a franchise tag, but the structure of the pact in terms of guaranteed money and its length will of course be major factors for Dugger’s camp to consider.

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