Jonathan Taylor Gets Paid Because He Remembers What Running Backs Are Supposed to Do

You know what I love about Jonathan Taylor signing that two-year, $44 million extension with the Indianapolis Colts? It's not just that the man is getting paid what he's worth. It's that somewhere in this modern NFL where everybody wants to throw the ball forty times a game, a team looked at their running back and said, "No, we're doing this the right way." The Colts are essentially saying that Taylor is a foundational piece of their offense, not some guy you pick up on a waiver wire and hope works out. That means something. That means they understand football.

Let me tell you something about running backs in this league right now. They don't get nearly the respect they used to, and I'm not just being nostalgic when I say that. You go back and watch games from the 1970s and 1980s, and you see teams that absolutely lived and died with their running back. That wasn't just because they couldn't throw it effectively. That was because coaches understood that you needed a guy who could carry the load, who could pick up the tough third down, who could keep a defense off balance even when everybody in the stadium knew he was getting the ball. Running backs are the heartbeat of an offense if you know how to use them. They're not just a luxury item. They're not just a thing you do when you're winning big. They're the thing that makes the whole machine work.

Jonathan Taylor understands this in his bones. When you watch him run, you see a guy who knows his assignment on every single play. He's not just running forward. He's reading blocks, he's finding cutback lanes, he's moving the pile when he needs to move it. He's a 245-pound missile that somehow moves like a guy who weighs 215. I've seen him turn an eight-yard run into a fourteen-yard gain just because he understood where the daylight was and had the vision to find it. That's not something you teach in a coaching clinic. That's something a guy either has or he doesn't. Taylor has it.

When the Colts signed him to this extension, they're making a statement about what they believe in as an organization. They're saying that they're not going to be one of those teams that gets cute and tries to win with eleventh-round picks at running back and a bunch of smoke and mirrors. They understand that in the NFL, you still need a guy who can line up and get four yards when you need four yards. You need a guy who's going to catch the football out of the backfield and move the chains. You need a guy who makes your quarterback's job easier because the defense has to account for him on every single play. That's what Jonathan Taylor is, and the Colts know it.

Now, I mentioned Bijan Robinson, and that's important context here. Robinson signed his deal with the Falcons, and it was a big moment in his career. Both of these guys are in that tier where they're absolutely premier talents, and the market has spoken. The market has said that a great running back in 2024 is worth serious money. That's a good thing for the position, because for a while there it seemed like the NFL was collectively deciding that running backs were obsolete. Teams were trading away their best backs for pennies, or letting them walk in free agency, or just not caring about the position anymore. That's not football sense. That's football laziness. Robinson and Taylor both proving their worth puts the running back position back where it belongs, which is at the center of a football team's identity.

What strikes me most about this deal is that Taylor did this with the Colts, a team that hasn't exactly been firing on all cylinders lately. They're not one of those franchises that's in constant playoff contention. They're a team that's building, that's got questions on the offensive line, that's got a quarterback in Anthony Richardson who's supremely talented but still finding his way. And yet Taylor signed a long-term extension anyway. That tells you something. It tells you that Taylor believes in what the Colts are building. It tells you he wants to be part of something. You don't do that deal if you don't think this team is heading somewhere good.

I remember when running backs were the signature piece of a franchise. You think about the Steelers with Franco Harris. You think about the Cowboys with Don Perlin and Herschel Walker. You think about the Bears with Walter Payton, who might have been the greatest running back who ever lived. These weren't guys who were interchangeable. These weren't guys you could swap out year to year. These were guys who defined their teams, who made their offenses work, who ran the football because that's what their coaches believed in. Jonathan Taylor has that kind of footprint on the Colts offense. He's one of the guys you build around.

The financial structure of this deal is interesting too. Forty-four million over two years, you're looking at an average of about twenty-two million a year. That's premium money, but not ridiculous money in this market. It's the kind of deal that says, "We value you, we want you here long-term, and we think you're going to help us win." It's not a mega deal, it's not the kind of thing that's going to break the salary cap, but it's enough to say that the Colts are serious about Taylor being part of their future. That's the kind of clarity that matters in a locker room. That's the kind of thing that keeps a team together.

You know what else I appreciate about this? Taylor could have gone somewhere else. He could have tested free agency potentially down the road. He could have chased the biggest number possible. Instead, he's choosing to stay with the Colts, to be part of a long-term project. That's loyalty, and it's increasingly rare in this league. It's the kind of thing that builds something real. Teams win championships because they've got guys who want to be there, who believe in each other, who understand that it's about the team and not just about the individual contract. Taylor just proved that he's that kind of guy.

The Colts made the right call here. They took care of their guy. They paid him what he's worth. They made it clear that they see him as central to their offense going forward. Now it's on the rest of the organization to build around him, to give him the quarterback, the offensive line, the receiving weapons, and the defensive pieces necessary to compete. That's the covenant between a player and a franchise. The Colts have done their part. Now let's see if they can do the rest.

For fans, here's why this matters. This is a team saying that the running back position still matters. This is a franchise rejecting the idea that football has completely passed by the ground game. Every time a great running back gets paid, every time a team commits long-term money to a guy who can carry the load, it's a little reminder that football at its core is still about moving the ball forward, about running right at people, about power and will and effort. Jonathan Taylor getting paid means the Colts still believe in that. That's the kind of football that wins in January. That's the kind of football that builds champions. Pay attention to the teams that still value the running back position. They're the ones that understand what football really is.