I don't look at that way. He's still has a year on his contract so both sides have time to bargain for a extension or to play out the contract and then he's a free agent. About the injury risk, Earl Thomas was in this situation, final year of his contract, got a season ending injury. He got his salary (huge money by the way) rehab on the Seahawks dime and then signed a big contract. So he got paid and all the Seahawks got was the bill. Injuries suck for organization because they don't get the players services but got to pay him, pay for the medical bills, pay for rehab.
He doesn’t have a year left on his contract. He signed a 4 year contract. NFL rules are rigged against the player. If Ayuik was a bust, he doesn’t see that fifth year. But he’s not a bust so he gets to work for half of his market value. When we are talking guys who play for 8-10 years, one season is 1/10 of his career.
He got 20 million guaranteed when he signed that contract and he was getting that no matter if he sucked or not.
$12.53M/4 years fully guaranteed.
How many rookies end up being bust but still rake in millions in guaranteed dollars? A lot more busts then stars but they still make a ton of money. The 5th year option balances this out a bit for teams but on the whole players signing those rookie contracts are coming out ahead. Stars get too big a chunk of the pie as is and it comes at the expense of their middle tier teammates.
Rookie contracts aren't doing young players any favours. When players could negotiate rookie contracts they earned more than they do now under the fixed contracts of the CBA. The players would earn even more if they were free agents coming out of college. 5th year options and then tagging players in year 6 is effectively underpaying them for longer. Rookie pay is increasing at a lower percentage than the growth in the salary cap. It's been that way since the 2010 CBA. The middle tier teammates are also being screwed because they're competing for roster spots against players on artificially low rookie contracts. That pushes their money down. The extra/excess salary cap money goes to the stars because there's nowhere else for it to go.
Matthew Stafford.
I'm not sure what you're saying.
He’ll be the highest paid player ever, if he goes one season longer than Rodgers.
Got crazy money on his rookie deal.
I'm not going to try and argue that the rookie salaries of Stafford and Bradford were good for the NFL, (they weren't), but if you sign rookies to 6 year deal then the system is broken before you start. $72M for 6 years was too high. Assuming Stafford would have been worth more each season during that rookie 6 year stint then he'd have been paid less than the $12M average for his 1st year. For context the QB franchise tag value was $14.65M. If Stafford had gotten $10.5M as a 2009 rookie it wouldn't have been a massive over-payment. The 2010 CBA rookie contract system was an over-correction and it is continuing to over-correct through 2024.
It was awful for the Lions.
Stafford's contract wasn't the problem. Calvin Johnson and Ndamukong Suh were the problem. Suh, the #2 pick of 2010, signed a 5 year deal with a base of $60M and a maximum of $68M. Suh's contract averaged $12M. In line with my previous thread post i'd say Suh was effectively getting below his contract average at $10M as a rookie. However, the 2010 franchise tag value for DT was $7M. Teams couldn't afford to pay for multiple top 5 pick rookies year after year. As a business you certainly can't pay a rookie 142% of the franchise tag in his cheapest year.
Stafford’s contract definitely was the problem.
sure...Bradford too.
The Lions couldn't tag Suh because they restructured his contract every year to delay cap hits. From memory his final season cap hit was almost double the DT franchise tag figure although his real salary was something around the tag figure. By NFL rules the tag amount is the official tag value or 120% of the individual cap figure. Tagging Suh would have cost more than twice the DT tag value. The Dolphins made Suh a better offer than the Lions did.
