Speculation about the Falcons trading wide receiver Julio Jones has been a running theme of the offseason in Atlanta and it grew more fevered on Monday.
During a phone conversation with Shannon Sharpe that was shown live on FS1, Jones said “I’m out of there” in reference to the Falcons and said he hoped to land with a contender for the 2021 season. Falcons head coach Arthur Smith had a video conference with reporters on Tuesday and Jones was the main topic of interest.
Smith wouldn’t say if Jones has requested a trade and said multiple times that he would not comment on a potential trade involving the wideout.
"[Players] should speak for themselves,” Smith said, via Zach Klein of WSB. “I’m not going to comment, it doesn’t change anything for us. We understand what our plan is moving forward. We have multiple private conversations with our players and those are conversations that are going to stay private on my end.”
Smith acknowledged that the Falcons need to create a good deal of cap space to sign their draft class and be able to make other moves. A post-June 1 trade involving Jones would open that space and recent days have made it feel a lot more likely that such a deal will take place.