The New England Patriots and Houston Texans completed a trade on Aug. 24, 2026: New England sent wide receiver Kayshon Boutte to Houston, and the Texans sent safety Jaylen Reed and a 2028 seventh-round draft pick to New England, according to reporting from ESPN, CBS Sports and NFL.com.
The move reshuffles a position group on each side. New England adds Reed to a safety group led by Kevin Byard and Craig Woodson, where he is expected to compete for a role. Houston loses Reed from its safety group but adds the receiver depth it needed after losing a projected starter to injury days earlier.
Key facts
- Trade date: Aug. 24, 2026
- Patriots sent: WR Kayshon Boutte
- Texans sent: S Jaylen Reed and a 2028 seventh-round draft pick
- Boutte’s 2025 season: 33 catches, 551 yards, 6 touchdowns in 10 starts
- Reed’s background: 2025 sixth-round pick, No. 187 overall, out of Penn State; started both of Houston’s playoff games as a rookie
Why the Texans made the move
The trade came about a week after Texans wide receiver Jayden Higgins tore his ACL during a joint practice against the Las Vegas Raiders, ending his 2026 season, according to ESPN, NFL.com and Bleacher Report. Higgins had been projected as Houston’s No. 2 receiver, and his injury left the Texans searching for depth at the position. Boutte is expected to help fill that gap, joining a receiver room led by Nico Collins alongside Jaylin Noel, Xavier Hutchinson and Tank Dell.
Boutte started 10 games for New England last season, catching 33 passes for 551 yards and six touchdowns. He played with quarterback Drake Maye over those two seasons in New England. In that span, per ESPN, he caught 76 passes for 1,140 yards and nine touchdowns in 29 games. New England drafted him out of LSU in the sixth round of the 2023 NFL Draft.
According to NBC Sports, the Patriots had built up receiver depth of their own this offseason — trading for A.J. Brown and signing Romeo Doubs — which made Boutte expendable from New England’s perspective. He had also requested a trade in the offseason, seeking more playing time. In return, New England gets Reed — a 2025 sixth-round pick who started both of Houston’s playoff games as a rookie — plus an extra 2028 draft pick.
Who is Jaylen Reed
Reed is not the same player as Jayden Reed, the Green Bay Packers wide receiver — the two share a similarly spelled name but are unconnected. Jaylen Reed is a safety Houston drafted out of Penn State in the sixth round, No. 187 overall, in the 2025 NFL Draft, according to his Wikipedia page and the Texans’ own roster site. He is listed at 6-foot, 211 pounds, and ran a 4.49-second 40-yard dash at his pre-draft evaluation.
In his final season at Penn State, Reed earned Second Team All-Big Ten honors, leading the team with 98 tackles while adding three interceptions and 2.5 sacks, according to Sports Illustrated. As a Texans rookie in 2025, he appeared in seven regular-season games, recording 14 tackles and a fumble recovery — including a game-high 12 tackles against Buffalo, per CBS Sports. His season was interrupted when a metal plate in his forearm — implanted during a college surgery — broke during a game, requiring surgical repair and a stint on injured reserve. He returned in time to start both of Houston’s playoff games as a rookie.
The early picture is limited: with seven regular-season appearances, there is not yet enough of an NFL track record to call him definitively good.
Now headed to New England as part of the trade, Reed joins a Patriots safety group currently led by Byard and Craig Woodson, with Dell Pettus, John Saunders Jr. and Mike Brown also competing for roles, according to Pats Pulpit. Where exactly he lands in that rotation has not been settled publicly.
How the trade was received
Trade grades from several outlets favored Houston, crediting the Texans with addressing a need at receiver while giving up little draft capital. New England’s return graded lower, in the C+ to C- range — CBS Sports put it most bluntly, headlining its story “Texans fleece Patriots.” That’s opinion, not reporting — a Boston.com column took the opposite view, arguing the Patriots made the wrong call in trading Boutte at all.
NESN and Heavy.com reported a social-media reaction from Reed around the trade, but the available record does not independently verify the post’s exact wording or whether it referred to the trade.
No official Patriots or Texans press release confirming the trade was located in the available reporting; ESPN, NFL.com and other outlets have reported it as completed. Some of the earliest reports described the move as an agreement between the two sides; ESPN and NFL.com have since reported it as a completed trade, and that’s where the record stands. Exactly how Boutte and Reed factor into each team’s Week 1 plans — including who starts at receiver in Houston or safety in New England — remains to be settled in training camp and preseason play.