METAIRIE, La. (AP) — The New Orleans Saints and top receiver Chris Olave have agreed on a four-year contract extension worth up to $132 million.
The Saints announced the extension Thursday without disclosing contract details. Agent Drew Rosenhaus, who represents Olave, confirmed the financial details, which were first reported by ESPN.
Olave, who had multiple concussions early in his career and missed the final game of last season with a blood clot, was entering his final season under his rookie contract. He is coming off his best season in the NFL, having been selected second-team AP All-Pro after posting career highs of 100 receptions, 1,163 yards receiving and nine touchdowns in 2025.
The deal, which runs through 2030, ends negotiations that began about a year ago.
Still, Olave had been present at offseason training activities and reported on time for training camp this week, but participated on a limited basis during the first two practices in an effort to minimize his exposure to potential injury.
“There’s the business side and there’s the football side, obviously. And we know sometimes those two overlap,” Saints coach Kellen Moore said after practice. “As long as we all communicate and we’re all on the same page. ... We always have to remind ourselves, everyone has the same goal. Everyone’s shooting for the same things. It’s just sometimes the business side takes a little bit of a lead on this for a matter of time."
Olave's injury history complicated contract negotiations. He has had multiple concussions, one of which sidelined him for nearly the last half of the 2024 season. Olave was sidelined by a blood clot at the end of last season, after which he went on blood thinners.
But he was fully cleared to practice by the start of camp, Saints general manager Mickey Loomis said.
Loomis portrayed Olave’s injury history as an “element” and a “variable” in the negotiations. But Loomis also spoke highly of Olave’s attitude and commitment to the club while negotiations have continued.
"Chris has been as enthusiastic and optimistic as anyone,” Loomis said. “So I really, really appreciate the way he’s conducted himself. And that’s not just this year — that’s every year with Chris. He’s an absolute joy to have on our team.”
Drafted 11th overall out of Ohio State in 2022, Olave eclipsed 1,000 yards receiving in each of his first two NFL seasons, during which he caught 159 passes for 2,165 yards and nine TDs combined.
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New Orleans Saints wide receiver Chris Olave (12) makes a catch during practice at the team's NFL football training camp in Metairie, La., Wednesday, July 29, 2026. (AP Photo/Matthew Hinton)
New Orleans Saints wide receiver Chris Olave (12) runs during practice at the team's NFL football training camp in Metairie, La., Wednesday, July 29, 2026. (AP Photo/Matthew Hinton)
New Orleans Saints wide receiver Chris Olave (12) makes a catch during practice at the team's NFL football training camp in Metairie, La., Wednesday, July 29, 2026. (AP Photo/Matthew Hinton)
The New Mexico attorney general is requesting the state's foster care system work to return a 15-year-old American citizen from Mexico after staff took the child to a Texas border crossing and allegedly forced him to walk across the border to be reunited to his estranged mother.
A civil lawsuit filed by state Attorney General Raúl Torrez against New Mexico's Children, Youth and Families Department said its staff drove the minor to El Paso, Texas, on July 6. The complaint, filed July 28, said the youth was instructed to cross the border bridge alone to find his mother, a Mexican national who was arrested on drug-related charges and deported earlier this year.
Torrez’s office is also asking a state judge to issue a temporary restraining order to block future reunifications that involve removing children from the U.S., unless those have court approval.
“The State of New Mexico cannot claim to protect children while abandoning one of its own at an international border,” Torrez said in a news release.
The documents said the child crossed into Mexico, wasn't immediately able to find his mother and then ran back across several lanes of traffic and reentered the U.S.
At that time, U.S. Customs and Border Protection urged New Mexico's child welfare agency to drive the child back to New Mexico, the attorney general's complaint says. But the documents state staff refused and allegedly said the child was now a “Texas problem” before leaving him at the border.
“The most important thing is that the child is safe and living with his mother, who CYFD has been in frequent contact with,” said Jake Thompson, a CYFD spokesperson in a statement Wednesday. “CYFD is reviewing the complaint and the order and will respond to them in court.”
After the border incident, the 15-year-old was left with the Texas Department of Family and Protective Services, the complaint states. Despite efforts to communicate with CYFD, Texas officials were allegedly forced to return the child to his mother in Mexico weeks later, according to the complaint. Email and phone messages to the Texas welfare agency were not returned Thursday.
Torrez said the boy remains in Mexico with his mother despite multiple attempts to reenter the U.S. Torrez called the case part of a broader pattern of neglect within the state’s foster care system and demanded CYFD staff do what they could to repatriate the teenager.
In a statement, CYFD denied the child’s safety was ever at risk and said his mother had requested he be reunited with her in Mexico. They said staff conducted two virtual home visits, concluding the situation was safe for him.
CYFD’s Office of Advocacy includes immigration specialists, which help children reunite with family members in other countries, according to its website.
“There is nothing in New Mexico state law that prohibits reuniting a child with a parent in another country, assuming it is done safely,” said Cristen Conley, director at the Corinne Wolfe Center for Child and Family Justice at the University of New Mexico.
Michael Coleman, a spokesperson for New Mexico Gov. Michelle Lujan Grisham, said the office, which is responsible for overseeing CYFD, has been in regular contact with the agency throughout the case.
“New Mexico and Texas authorities, and a New Mexico judge, independently concluded that the child should be with his mother,” Coleman said in a statement. “The Attorney General’s office is now asking for the child to be returned to New Mexico. The filing does not state where the child will live or who will take care of him if that happens.”
In April, the New Mexico Department of Justice released a 200-page report detailing what it alleged were systemic failures in the welfare agency that meant children were returned to dangerous environments while department staff prioritized reunification over safety. The case also comes as the Trump administration seeks to deport immigrant children by accessing data from the Office of Refugee Resettlement and attempting to bypass previous court rulings.
After the border incident, the teenager contacted the Office of the Child Advocate, an independent government watchdog that monitors the child welfare system, which eventually referred the case to the New Mexico Department of Justice.
The child's parents are two Mexican nationals, but he had been living with his siblings and godmother in the U.S. and hadn't had contact with either parent in years, according to the attorney general's complaint.
According to the complaint, the godmother attempted to send him to Mexico to live with family earlier this summer, but he ran away and ended up at a New Mexico hospital near the border. When he was ready to be discharged in June, the hospital refused to release him to his godmother because she was not the official guardian and instead contacted CYFD. He eventually was placed in foster care, the complaint reads.
Torrez's office alleges that CYFD didn't conduct proper risk assessments of the child's mother and instructed a minor to cross an international border on foot without an adult. Documents also say the child has a heart condition that requires daily medication, but CYFD staff didn't make a sufficient attempt to ensure continued medical care following the reunification.
Schuettler is a corps member for The Associated Press/Report for America Statehouse News Initiative. Report for America is a nonprofit national service program that places journalists in local newsrooms to report on undercovered issues.
FILE - New Mexico Attorney General Raúl Torrez speaks on Wednesday, May 8, 2024, in Albuquerque, N.M. (Jon Austria/The Albuquerque Journal via AP, File)
