What’s Holding Up Bucs LB Josiah Trotter’s Contract?

Six of the Bucs’ seven 2026 draft picks are signed. Josiah Trotter is not, and he’s probably not going to be for a while.

If that sounds familiar, it should.

Last year the Bucs took Benjamin Morrison at pick No. 53 and didn’t get him under contract until July 20. Five of their six picks were signed by mid-May and Morrison sat there as the lone holdout while the rest of the league worked through the same problem with second-rounders at the same time. This year, Trotter is sitting in the exact same spot, only the math has gotten more complicated, and the leverage has tilted further toward the player.

Here’s what’s actually being negotiated.

The Structural Shift That Broke The Second Round

Salary guarantees have been the major negotiation points for agents and teams when it comes to rookie contracts since the 2011 NFL-NFLPA Collective Bargaining Agreement. Once the NFL set a hard slotting system for rookie wages the fight shifted from total amount and number of years to how much of the slot could the player ensure they would absolutely get. In 2022, Lewis Cine was able to get full guarantees at pick No.32, setting the precedent that every first rounder go-forward had a four-year guaranteed wage. That precedent held for all of one year.

Then in May 2025, the Texans gave second-rounder Jayden Higgins a fully guaranteed four-year contract at pick No. 34. No second-round pick had ever received a fully guaranteed deal before. The Browns immediately matched at pick No. 33 with Carson Schwesinger, and from there the dam broke. The NFL world watched pick No. 40 – quarterback Tyler Shough and the New Orleans Saints.

After Derek Carr’s retirement, Shough was the presumed face of the franchise and held considerable leverage to get a fully guaranteed deal himself. That leverage paid off and every pick ahead of him slotted into the precedent. Eight second round picks. Every dollar locked in.

Then it stopped at pick No. 41.

Below pick No. 40, the deals last year became a slot-by-slot ladder of partial guarantees. T.J. Sanders at No. 41 settled for 94.6% total guarantee with 77.5% of Year 4 locked in. Mason Taylor at No. 42 came in at 91.3% total and 60% Year 4. The numbers stepped down at a roughly predictable rate from there: Alfred Collins 88% total, Donovan Ezeiruaku 86%, JT Tuimoloau 84%. By the time you reached Terrance Ferguson at pick No. 46, the Rams settled at 82.8% total with just 23% of Year 4 guaranteed.

Ferguson is the comp that matters. Pick No. 46 in 2025. The same slot Trotter was selected in this year.

We now have a relevant data point for 2026.

Aaron Wilson reported on Friday that the Colts finalized C.J. Allen’s contract at pick No. 53. Allen got 83.67% of his deal guaranteed and the first three years are fully locked in. That’s up from Morrison’s 75.4% total guarantee at the same slot in 2025, with no Year 4 protection at all.

In one year, pick No. 53 jumped 8.3 percentage points of total guarantee and the structure of the deal got fundamentally rewritten. Three years fully guaranteed wasn’t on the table for second-round picks below pick No. 51 last summer. It is now.

The implication for Trotter’s camp is straightforward. If pick No. 53 just cleared 83% guaranteed, the floor for pick No. 46 has to be higher. Significantly higher. The Ferguson comp from 12 months ago is no longer the starting point of the conversation, it’s the floor the new conversation builds from.

Why Josiah Trotter Likely Won’t Sign His Bucs Rookie Contract Anytime Soon

This is the part that matters for understanding the timing. Bucs rookie linebacker Josiah Trotter is not really negotiating with the team right now. He’s waiting on picks Nos. 41 through 45 to sign first.

Last year was the first year fully guaranteed contracts existed in the second round, and the line landed at pick No. 40 (Tyler Shough). This year the early signings will determine whether the line moves down. If pick No. 41 signs a fully guaranteed contract, that becomes the new floor. If pick 42 signs one, the floor moves again. Trotter’s leverage point is to ask for full guarantees and hold that position until a player drafted ahead of him signs for less. The moment that happens, his number becomes clearer. Somewhere above Ferguson and below that player.

This is why the Bucs don’t have a real path to getting Trotter signed in May or even June. Until the picks ahead of him resolve, there’s no anchor to negotiate against. Every team in the league with a Round 2 pick from No. 41 through No. 45 is in the same staring contest, and somebody has to blink first. The team that gives in first sets the market for everybody behind them.

Unless the Bucs just want to set the market themselves and acquiesce to Trotter’s fully guaranteed request. But I don’t see them doing that.

Josiah Trotter’s Rookie Contract Projection

When the dust settles, here’s where the deal is likely to land.

The total guarantee for Josiah Trotter’s rookie contract should come in somewhere around 88% to 91%. Pick 53 grew 8.3 percentage points year over year at the same slot, and pick No. 46 already grew 8.7 points from 2024 to 2025 (Jonathon Brooks at 74.1% to Ferguson at 82.8%). Even assuming the growth rate decelerates a bit as the slot gets closer to the 100% ceiling, another six to eight points on top of Terrance Ferguson’s number is a reasonable expectation. Call it 89% as the central estimate.

The Year 4 guarantee is where the structural shift from the Allen deal will show up most clearly. Pick No. 46’s-year 4 number went from 0% in 2024 to 23% in 2025. Allen cleared that at pick No. 53, getting 30% of his year 4 salary guaranteed. A similar jump for Trotter should land somewhere in the 45% to 55% range.

Trotter’s camp will open by asking for a fully guaranteed deal. That’s the right ask given the cascading market above him. The Bucs will counter in the low 30s on Year 4, anchored on the Ferguson framework and their organizational preference for protecting cash flexibility on the back end. The deal that gets signed will land somewhere between those two positions, almost certainly after picks Nos. 41 through 45 have all set their numbers, and almost certainly in late June or July.

The Bucs’ draft class is functionally complete. The training camp roster is set. There’s no urgency on either side to close this faster than the rest of the league forces it to close. Trotter will sign when the market tells him what the right number is, and not a day before.

If history is any guide, expect the announcement somewhere around the third week of July, just like Benjamin Morrison last year. Same slot the year before, same delay, same general dynamic. The only thing that has changed is the size of the number on the contract.