Why Giants legend believes Davante Adams trade rumors

New York Giants legend and current NFL analyst Tiki Barber believes that star Las Vegas Raiders wide receiver Davante Adams revealed a lot, intentionally or unintentionally, when he tried to dismiss summer trade rumors involving the New York Jets.

"If you don’t care about something, or it’s not true, you just ignore it," Barber explained during Wednesday's edition of the WFAN afternoon show, as Ryan Chichester of Audacy shared. "Indifference, in this case, is better. Just ignore it. To come out and directly address it tells you that there’s some basis to it."

While eyebrows were raised when Jets starting quarterback Aaron Rodgers said last week that he "can't wait to play with [Adams] again," the story took a different turn after former New York signal-caller and current NFL analyst Boomer Esiason reported on Monday that Gang Green acquiring Adams could happen "somewhere in late August" or "early September." Esiason has repeated that take throughout the week even though Adams' agents said on Tuesday there had been "absolutely no trade talk" regarding their client.

During a conversation recorded for the latest episode of the "Club Shay Shay" podcast hosted by Hall of Famer Shannon Sharpe, Adams insisted he is "locked in with the Raiders." Interestingly, Adams also acknowledged that "the thought of playing with [Rodgers] is obviously amazing." The two were teammates with the Green Bay Packers from 2014 through the 2021 season.

"I wasn’t paying attention until Boomer said that there is some fire around this smoke, and when [Adams'] agents came out and said something," Barber continued. "That’s when I started saying, 'This has to be something.' Otherwise, they wouldn’t have come out and talked about it."

Adams agreed to a five-year, $141.25M contract to join the Raiders via a trade from the Packers in March 2022, and it's unclear how that deal may or may not impact the Jets' alleged interest in the 31-year-old. Las Vegas may not want to trade its best offensive talent without being able to immediately replace him before the upcoming season. Still, Adams theoretically could make things uncomfortable for the Raiders between now and the end of August if he truly wants to join the Jets.