Patriots safety Kyle Dugger isn’t any longer on the transition tag. Per Mike Garafolo and Eric Edholm of NFL Media, player and team are in agreement on a four-year contract, which NFL Media colleague Ian Rapoport says has a base value of $58MM (including $32.5MM in guaranteed money). The utmost value, in accordance with Rapoport, is $66MM.
This offseason, Latest England made it some extent to retain its homegrown talent, re-signing players like Michael Onwenu, Anfernee Jennings, and Josh Uche. At one time, Dugger seemed the likeliest of that group to stay in Foxborough on a long-term basis, with the Patriots submitting a $13MM/12 months offer to the Lenoir-Rhyne product shortly before the deadline to use the franchise or transition tag. The 2 sides were unable to come back to terms prior to that deadline, which compelled the Pats to deploy the transition tag, however it ultimately didn’t take too long for an agreement to be consummated.
Per the principles of the transition tag, if Dugger had signed a proposal sheet with one other team and Latest England declined to match the offer sheet, the Patriots would have received no draft pick compensation. Fortunately for them, no outside club prolonged a proposal, as Dan Duggan of The Athletic confirms. As such, all of the Pats needed to do was bump the common annual value of Dugger’s recent contract ($14.5MM) barely above the $13.8MM transition tag value to get a deal done.
By way of each AAV and total guarantees, Dugger now ranks fifth within the league’s safety hierarchy (excluding Bucs safety Antoine Winfield Jr., who stays on the franchise tag as of the time of this writing). That underscores his importance to Latest England’s defense, a unit that finished within the top-10 in total yardage and defensive DVOA in 2023.
Now 28, Dugger has been a full-time starter for many of his four-year profession, racking up nine interceptions (including two pick-sixes) and 20 passes defensed along the way in which. He has not yet earned any Pro Bowl acclaim, and his Pro Football Focus evaluation in 2023 was lower than ideal; PFF assigned him an abysmal 50.0 coverage grade and thought of him the 68th-best safety out of 95 qualified players.
While it’s true that Dugger is more suited to play near the road of scrimmage — he eclipsed 100 tackles for the primary time in his profession last season — he did yield a reasonably modest 82.7 QB rating on passes thrown in his direction in 2023, and his PFF evaluation was rather more favorable in 2022, when the advanced metrics placed him because the Eleventh-best safety amongst 88 qualifiers.
No matter what PFF might say, the Patriots clearly consider Dugger to be a foundational player and value his versatility (along with lining up within the box and at free safety, he has also seen motion as a slot and boundary corner, on special teams, and even on the D-line). His recent contract will keep him under club control into the Pats’ next competitive window.
