Patriots’ 2026 draft day trades, analyzed

TL;DR

The New England Patriots executed four trades during the 2026 NFL Draft, moving up in both the first and second rounds. They acquired key players Caleb Lomu and Gabe Jacas while also trading back twice on Day 3.

Key points

Patriots had 11 draft selections, tied for second most in the NFL
They executed four trades during the draft
Acquired OT Caleb Lomu and EDGE Gabe Jacas
Traded up from 63rd to 55th overall in the second round
Paid a premium for both trades according to trade value charts

Mentioned in this story

NFL

New England PatriotsCaleb LomuGabe Jacas

Feb 27, 2025; Indianapolis, IN, USA; New England Patriots general manager Eliot Wolf speaks during the 2025 NFL Scouting Combine at the Indiana Convention Center. Mandatory Credit: Kirby Lee-Imagn Images | Kirby Lee-Imagn Images With 11 selections in hand, tied for second most among the league’s 32 teams, the New England Patriots entered the NFL Draft in prime position to move around the board and attempt to maximize the value of their selections. In total, they ended up swinging four trades. The reigning AFC champions moved up the board in both the first and second rounds, and later traded back twice on Day 3. Using the different trade charts collected by NFL analyst Joseph Hefner, let’s take a look at those transactions to see how the team performed from a value perspective. Before starting out, though, a quick word on the different charts. There are two types: trade charts and player value charts. In the simplest of terms, the first group aims at analyzing the value teams put on the different selections, while the others look at how players selected in those spots have historically performed relatively to factors such as their rookie contract values.

Trade No. 1: Up with Bills

The first round of the NFL Draft saw a run on offensive linemen, with eight of them having come off the board by the time the Bills were on the clock at No. 28 overall. Among those eight were five offensive tackles, leaving only one of the consensus top-tier guys left standing: Caleb Lomu out of Utah. If a team wanted to leave Round 1 with a tackle, now was the time because there was a clear drop-off after Lomu. The Patriots didn’t hesitated, and opted to invest two selections — No. 31 and No. 125 in the fourth round — to jump up three spots with their division rivals Judging the move solely by the trade value charts, we can see that it is a fairly even one. While the Patriots got slightly better value on the Jimmy Johnson chart, the Bills came out ahead on the Rich Hill chart (which is a more accurate reflection of how teams view picks these days). That slight pro-Buffalo tilt was also found by NFL analyst Anthony Reinhard, whose trade calculations resulted in an 0.8% premium paid on the move by New England — making this a marginal overpay. “I would say we we’ve been working the phones pretty regularly, not only today but throughout the week, just trying to find different contingencies,” Patriots executive vice president of player personnel Eliot Wolf told reporter after the first round. “There were a lot of trades. There continue to be a lot of trades. I think there was one right when I was walking down here as well. But yeah, we were very active on the phones. Ryan [Cowden] and Matt Groh did a great job of kind of working the phones and trying to understand where the value was. And ultimately, with Caleb still on the board, we just felt like giving up the extra pick to make sure that we could acquire him was important.” While the Patriots ended up sending two picks to Buffalo, the Bills decided to repurpose those in follow-up moves. As a consequence, the that stemmed from that first-round trade look as follows: