[Husker] D WIlliams

[Steve Schmadeke]

I haven't made any attempt to dig deeper into the numbers you listed,  
but if the relative size of the contracts looks odd, it is quite  
possible that the deal Pace signed is padded with a lot of non- 
guaranteed money either for cap reasons or because of his history as a  
former bust.

NFL contracts as reported by the media and the players' agents often  
include funny money contract years that are never seriously expected  
to be paid out.  To really judge the worth of the deal, you have to  
know more about the structure than what is typically reported,  
starting with the guaranteed portion of the contract.

Signing bonuses are prorated through the life of the contract for  
salary cap purposes.  When signing a player, teams often have little  
wiggle room under the cap during the early years of the contract.  One  
technique for dealing with that is to stretch out the life of the  
contract, leaving the signing bonus itself unchanged, but resulting in  
fewer cap dollars per year.

But, of course, the player doesn't really want to be locked up for  
that long for only the same guarantee.  To work it out, the last  
couple of years in the artificially lengthened contract will often  
have either exorbitantly high salaries or high roster bonuses.  This  
is motivation for the team to either rework the contract or allow the  
player to become a free agent at the end of the natural length of the  
deal before the additional years that were tacked on just to make the  
prorated signing bonus fit under the cap during the early years of the  
deal.

Of course, the team could choose to pay those salaries or bonuses if  
the player's value increased that much during the life of the  
contract, but there is usually no expectation on either party's side  
that that will happen.  In the meantime, however, the player does get  
bragging rights for such a large deal, the media gets to gush over one  
of the highest-paid players at such-and-such position and the team  
gets to show the fans how committed they are for trying to build or  
keep a winner.

This is how Dallas found the cap room to sign Deion Sanders in the  
mid-90's.  They put together a seven-year deal that was huge by the  
standards of the day.  But Deion never completed the contract,  
retiring as expected before the last portions of the contract kicked in.

To rein in this practice somewhat, the NFL made some rules about  
funding the deferred signing and other bonuses in advance and  
tightened the rules about accelerating the remaining cap hit for the  
signing bonus when a player is released or traded.  I think the trend  
towards greater use of roster bonuses in recent years is also tied to  
some new rules about changes in salaries between each contract year.

The media also has been somewhat more skeptical when reporting these  
deals.  ESPN often will note the guaranteed portion of the contract  
when reporting on a deal, but unfortunately, they usually don't  
provide the information needed to figure out whether that six-year  
deal has a natural life of four years or five years.

As I said in the opening paragraph, I haven't looked at the deals in  
question, so I don't know where these contracts really stand relative  
to each other.  Given that Briggs was publicly unhappy with getting  
the franchise tag slapped on him last year, I don't think that he  
would have settled for less than market value.  And you make a good  
point that Pace's market value probably shouldn't be higher than  
Briggs' value.  The difference might be in the structure of the  
contract.

Or it may just mean that the Jets GM is a sucker who is making a poor  
evaluation of Pace's future performance.  :-)

--Steve Schmadeke

On Mar 4, 2008, at 6:17 AM, Andy Knipp wrote:
>
> So Demorrio Williams has signed a free agent contract with KC valued  
> at
> 16.5 M over 5 years. When compared to the contract Lance Briggs (All  
> Pro)
> got from Chicago (6 years 36 M) it seems appropriate. Now I read the  
> LB
> Calvin Pace signed with the jets for 6 years, 42M. Each player has 4  
> or 5
> years experience. Pace was a former 1st round bust in AZ, earning the
> starting role last year. How he commands more money than Briggs and  
> twice
> per year as Williams I don't get.