The NFL opener between the Rams and Bills is just a week away, and as the season approaches, there have been some interesting items in the final run-up of action off the field before we turn our attention to the field. Here are a few insights:
Wilson gets paid, but not enough
The Broncos rewarded their new quarterback, Russell Wilson, a player who certainly added to the eye-popping franchise sale price of $4.6 billion. The deal is impressive from a cash standpoint. Although I have not seen details, reports are that the five extension years are worth $245 million, including $165 million guaranteed. The contract binds Wilson, the former Seahawks quarterback turned Denver signal-caller after a trade in March, to the Broncos for seven years and $296 million. However, no matter what the numbers, the fact that it is a contract that’s not fully guaranteed is a win, a huge win, for NFL management.
The Deshaun Watson deal set a precedent, or so we thought, for full guarantees for elite quarterbacks. And while recent extensions for Derek Carr and Kyler Murray did not include those guarantees, the argument could be made that they were not elite-level players. With Wilson, however, there is no such argument. And with his deal now set to run seven years, even Wilson will be vulnerable in future contract talks to a release or a pay reduction.
The Broncos have an owner worth $60 billion, and they easily could have funded $250 million or $300 million of future guarantees for their franchise player, but they avoided doing so. That alone is a huge win for management.
Ravens owner Steve Biscotti now has the ammunition he needs to repeat assertions by many owners that the Watson deal was an outlier and aberration. It has been up to agents of elite players to push against that narrative, but it clearly has not worked. Now it is up to Lamar Jackson, with or without an agent, to be strong in his stance. He has youth on his side compared to Wilson, and performance on his side compared to Watson.
Maybe the Watson deal will not have the ripples many on the player side hoped for. And that is a disappointment, as it will mean NFL contracts—in terms of security and strength for players—will continue to pale in comparison to NBA and Major League Baseball contracts.
Hold-ins over Hold-outs
First, let’s get some definitions out of the way, along with a pet peeve. A holdout is a player under contract who is not reporting to his team. A holdout an unsigned player, such as a rookie yet to sign his first NFL contract or a franchise player yet to sign his one-year franchise tender. In the latter category, the Bengals’ Jesse Bates was one of those players up until last week; he was not holding out as there was no contract to hold out from. Glad to get that off my chest.
As contract negotiator for the Packers, I felt very little, if any, stress about holdouts; they were out of sight and out of mind, and we had too many other issues to worry about. Since the new CBAs starting in 2011 and continuing in ’20, holdouts have become exceedingly rare, as there are stepped-up penalties and free-agency consequences. Instead, a new phenomenon has entered the business of football: hold-ins
Hold-ins report to training camp, but only as an embodiment of the Marshawn Lynch quote, ” They show good faith by reporting as they hope/wait for contract upgrades while doing little on the field. Unlike holdouts, hold-ins need to be dealt with and resolved before the season. And the strategy has been effective, more so than the holdout strategy, in getting players better contracts or better situations. It started a few years ago when Jalen Ramsey held in and got himself out of Jacksonville. Last year, T.J. Watt held in with the Steelers before being rewarded with a top-of-market deal for defensive players. And this year Derwin James just successfully held in with the Chargers, Chauncey Gardner-Johnson got himself out of New Orleans to Philadelphia, and three wide receivers—Diontae Johnson (Steelers), DK Metcalf (Seahawks) and Deebo Samuel (49ers)—got themselves paid with that strategy (more on them below).
We now have a clear pattern toward bringing a young player’s contract out of its fixed and reasonable rookie-wage-scale earnings into the top-tier veteran stratosphere:Stay (mostly) quiet during the offseason, report to camp, do not participate in drills or on-field work and get paid. The truth: Holding in works better than holding out.
Except in one situation.
