The Colts will enter this year's draft without something 28 teams have: a first-round pick. In a trade with the New York Jets in November, Chris Ballard sent the team's 2026 and 2027 first-round picks away in exchange for two-time first-team AP All-Pro cornerback Sauce Gardner.
Despite being dealt for two high-level picks, Gardner doesn't feel the weight of the trade.
"It ain't no pressure, you know," Gardner said Tuesday. "If I got to be the first-round pick the next two years, I'm going to work regardless."
Gardner was sidelined for five games in 2025 due to a non-contact calf injury he sustained in Week 13 against the Houston Texans. What was initially feared to be an Achilles tear was confirmed to be a strain, limiting his debut Colts season to just three games.
In 2026, he's determined to prove he is worth the haul Ballard and the Colts sent to the Jets.
"I'm always trying to figure out and find ways to get better," he said. "This whole organization, if there's anything I could do better, or anything that they want to see out of me, they're going to tell me."
In 59 career games, the former Defensive Rookie of the Year has 19 interceptions, 49 passes defended and 36 pass breakups. He has also had 24 run stops.
"His resumé speaks for itself," head coach Shane Steichen said in November. "He's an unbelievable player. To get a bona fide number one corner in this league, it elevates everybody around us. He's got all the elite traits you look for. He's sticky in coverage, the pass-breakups, the interceptions, he's feisty, he's aggressive. Just to add that to the fold in the back end with the guys we already got back there, it's going to elevate everybody."
Coming in later in the year, Gardner was surrounded by leadership. Kenny Moore II and Zaire Franklin were the veteran voices in the locker room. With Franklin being traded this offseason and Moore requesting a trade, the 24-year-old Gardner knows he must step up as a leader.
"Being able to come in midseason and just see how those guys are leading the team is definitely something I pay attention to," he said. "I feel like cornerbacks (aren't) really captains on teams all the time, and that's definitely something I want to chase."
