Ja'Lynn Polk will miss the entire 2025 season after undergoing shoulder surgury.
Ja'Lynn Polk will miss the entire 2025 season after undergoing shoulder surgury.Barry Chin/Globe Staff
The Patriots are trading wide receiver Ja’Lynn Polk to the Saints, a league source confirmed Saturday.
In exchange for a 2027 sixth-round draft pick, the Patriots will send 23-year-old Polk and a 2028 seventh-round pick to New Orleans.
The transaction marks an unceremonious end of Polk’s brief and underwhelming tenure in New England. The Patriots drafted Polk in the second round last year, with hopes that he could have an immediate impact and serve as a reliable contributor. But his rookie season proved to be incredibly disappointing, as he finished with just 12 catches for 87 yards.
“I hate to use this analogy, but you know in ‘The Dark Knight,’ it’s, the hero you need isn’t the hero that you have?” executive vice president of player personnel Eliot Wolf said in February at the scouting combine. “I think organizationally we maybe put too much on his plate early, and I think that really stunted his growth a little bit.”
Polk underwent offseason shoulder surgery that limited his availability throughout the spring. When he returned to the field for training camp, he expressed an interest to enter the year with “a new focus.” Despite his draft status, Polk was still going to have to earn his spot on the roster because of the number of offseason moves the Patriots made at the position.
A shoulder injury suffered in the preseason opener, though, ended Polk’s 2025 season before it could even begin. The team placed him on injured reserve without the designation to return.
Polk was under contract through the 2027 season. If he remained with the Patriots, he was once again going to have to fight for a roster spot next summer. Instead, he’ll get a fresh start with a rebuilding team in New Orleans.
Nicole Yang can be reached at nicole.yang@globe.com.Follow her @nicolecyang.