Broncos signing former Lions receiver Josh Reynolds

The Denver Broncos are signing former Detroit Lions wide receiver Josh Reynolds to a two-year, $14 million free agent contract, a person with knowledge of the deal told The Associated Press on Wednesday.

The person spoke anonymously to divulge the deal, which the Broncos didn’t immediately announce.

Reynolds’ signing continues a makeover of the Broncos’ offense that included trading away former firstround pick Jerry Jeudy to Cleveland for a pair of midround draft selections.

Reynolds, who caught 40 passes for 608 yards and five touchdowns last season for the Lions, joins a receiving corps that features Marvin Mims Jr., Courtland Sutton and Tim Patrick, who has missed each of the last two seasons with injuries.

Reynolds, 29, has 19 career touchdown receptions across seven NFL seasons with the Rams, Titans and Lions. He joined the league as a fourth-round draft pick by the Rams out of Texas

A&M in 2017.

The Broncos lost center Lloyd Cushenberry in free agency to the Titans, leaving Alex Forsyth and Luke Wattenberg to battle it out this summer as his replacement, and Denver also is in the quarterback market with increasing expectations they’ll move up from the 12th overall pick in the NFL draft next month to grab one of the top QB prospects.

“It’s hard to predict what the cost is and yet, I certainly wouldn’t say that it’s unrealistic,” said Broncos coach Sean Payton, who decided to move on from Russell Wilson after a tumultuous 2023 season together.

Reynolds’ departure from Detroit comes as a mild surprise. At the league’s annual owners meetings in Orlando, Florida, this week, Lions general manager Brad Holmes indicated he hoped to re-sign Reynolds.

“He’s one that was part of the original plans” in free agency, Holmes said then. “Still having dialogue, we’ll just kind of see where that goes. But that’s really the only one that’s still out there that we had originally planned so far.”