DeForest Buckner Trade: 49ers Bring Back Their Former First-Round Pick From the Colts for a 2027 Fourth-Rounder
San Francisco drafted DeForest Buckner seventh overall in 2016, traded him to Indianapolis in 2020, and has now brought the three-time Pro Bowl defensive tackle home - for a fourth-round pick, in the second Colts sell-off deal of the day.
The San Francisco 49ers have acquired defensive tackle DeForest Buckner in a trade with the Indianapolis Colts, a source confirmed to NBC Sports Bay Area on Tuesday. NFL Media's Ian Rapoport first reported the deal, and the Colts announced they will receive a 2027 fourth-round draft pick in return. The trade is pending a physical.
The move closes a loop that opened six years ago. San Francisco selected Buckner with the No. 7 overall pick in the 2016 NFL Draft, he made the Pro Bowl in 2018, and after four seasons the 49ers traded him to Indianapolis for a first-round pick in the 2020 draft that became defensive tackle Javon Kinlaw. Buckner, now 32, has remained productive in the middle: in seven games with the Colts this season he has 31 combined tackles, four tackles for loss, eight quarterback hits, three passes defensed, a fumble recovery and four sacks - and 75.5 sacks across his 11 NFL seasons. Tight end George Kittle, his teammate from 2017 through 2019, celebrated the reunion publicly.
For Indianapolis, the trade was not a one-off. It was the second high-profile deal of the day for the 2-5 Colts, who earlier sent All-Pro guard Quenton Nelson to Seattle - a sell-off by a team going the other direction. Buckner is in the final stretch of the two-year, $46 million extension he signed with Indianapolis in April 2024, carries a $7.9 million salary-cap hit this season and is set to become an unrestricted free agent this offseason. San Francisco, heading into its Week 8 bye, gets the bye week to fold him into defensive coordinator Raheem Morris's system before its Week 9 game against Las Vegas.
