Champ Bailey to sign with Denver today

Trades goin through...

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A15782-2004Feb28.html

 

and because of that, Ty Law now wants more money...

It's cheaper to keep Law than to replace him
01:00 AM EST on Saturday, February 28, 2004
BY TOM E. CURRAN - Providence Journal Sports Writer

Ty Law wants to be paid as the best cornerback in football. He already has been.

Before the 1999 season, Law signed a seven-year, $49-million deal with a $13-million signing bonus that seemed at the time to be outrageous. Turns out, he's earning every penny.

He's been to the Pro Bowl four times in his career, won a couple of Super Bowls (and should have been MVP of one of them), picked off 39 passes, hit people hard and played through pain. From the start of the 1998 season through the 2004 Super Bowl, he's been the best in the league at his position, and five years after he retires he should get serious Hall of Fame consideration.

The Patriots paid him on potential, and so far he's fulfilled it.

But now, as he enters the final two seasons of that massive contract and the salary-cap numbers are backbreakingly big, the two sides are working on an extension. The Patriots reportedly offered a four-year, $26-million extension with a $6.6-million bonus. Law says he wants the Patriots to give him another blockbuster. He wants more than Washington's Champ Bailey is reportedly about to get after he's traded to Denver -- six years, $53 million, with $18 million guaranteed up front.

"I need to be making that and a little bit more to make me feel better," Law told the Boston Globe on Thursday. "Hands down, I feel like I'm the best cornerback in the league. If other good cornerbacks are getting that kind of money, I want to be paid accordingly. I consider myself to be the best of the bunch."

Here's the thing: Ty Law was paid to be the best corner in football. That's what his contract's dollar amount implicitly said.

The Patriots ponied up, and Law has so far played to the price tag. A rare win-win in professional sports.

But should the Patriots extend his contract and again pay the 30-year-old, who's entering his 10th season as the best in the game, when he will no longer be the best in football by 2006 or 2007?

To oversimplify things, a contract can either be a down payment on a player's potential (as Law's was) or a reward for services rendered while a player was underpaid.

Law was never underpaid. And he earned every penny of the richest corner contract in football. But you can't bet he'll be able to do it again, not in his mid-30s.

You can't fault Law for wanting the fattest deal at his position. In a player's mind, this is the way business is done.

"I don't see another guy better than me, so why shouldn't I get paid more than everyone else?" he said.

That would make sense if elite players would accept one-year contracts that didn't have massive signing bonuses. The Patriots would probably be happy to pay Law $10 million each year in straight salary for as long as he stayed the best corner in football. When his play dropped, his contract would drop.

But players can't have that because contracts aren't guaranteed. Hypothetically, if Law signed a one-year deal to play for $10 million and then his leg fell off, that would be it. No more football, no more money. So you lobby for, say, a six-year deal with $15 million up front. You get that $15 million paid out plus an agreed-upon salary each year until the team releases you, whether that's two years into the six-year deal or six years.

In order to pay Law what he wants, the team has to come up with a six-year deal, for instance, that spreads his hoped-for signing bonus of more than $18 million out so that it counts $3 million per year against the cap. (Signing bonuses are paid to the player when he signs, but teams are allowed to evenly distribute that total over the length of the contract).

If the Patriots sign Law to the deal he wants now, they will pay dearly for it down the road when his cap number is eight figures long and he can't come close to playing to it.

The situation may appear to be coming to a head, but it probably isn't. While the Patriots are making efforts to negotiate an extension, they can handle Law's 2004 cap hit of around $10 million (Law hit a 2003 incentive that raised his cap number in 2004 from $9.4 million). With some fancy stepping, they probably could handle his projected $12.5-million cap hit in 2005, as well.

They can keep the reigning best corner in football for two more seasons and may well do so because, with every veteran near the end of a deal, the question is, "What does it cost in new money to replace him?"

For instance, if the Pats let Law go and then try to find a 75 percent replacement, they'll still be looking at guaranteed money in the $6- to $8-million range that has to be paid immediately. Add to that about $1.5 or $2 million in first-year salary. That's as much as $10 million in new money that has to be paid out to the new guy in that first year.

Meanwhile, Law already has his bonus. So the real money (salary and incentives) the Patriots pay out to him this year is just over $7 million. Next year, it would be $9.8 million in real money.

The cost to replace Ty Law -- if that can be done -- is arguably more expensive than keeping him through the end of his deal.

And while Law's comments make for interesting reading, push probably won't come to shove on this matter for a long time.

 

I can't stand when these guys start this "I need to be paid more than him" crap....Handicap your team with huge salary cap eating salary and then you will be wondering why you never make it back to the playoffs...

Oh wait, Ty has two rings now....He probably is tired of all the media attention associated with winning. Sounds like the man wants to cruise into retirement now. He gots his hardware, now it is time for the bling bling...

 

I like to see the Big Dogs like the Colts, and Patriots having to use up 20% or better on one player. So much for whats best for the team

 

The rumors floating the boards now (completely unsubstantiated) are that the Redskins will ship Portis to New England as soon as the trade is done in exchange for Ty Law and New England's 2 first rounders. Don't know if I believe that one, but it's fun to speculate about.

Ah, an offseason as a Skins fan is never boring. Too bad the regular season blows.

 

Ain't that the truth.

 

http://www.profootballtalk.com/rumormill.htm

There's a wild rumor making the rounds that the Washington Redskins are acquiring Broncos running back Clinton Portis with an eye toward promptly trading him to the New England Patriots for the team's two first-round draft choices and Pro Bowl cornerback Ty Law.

We're sharing the rumor not because we've heard from a league insider that it's legit, but because the whole thing seems sufficiently outlandish to be true.

True, that is, from the standpoint of the Redskins, who have proven to be creative to the point of reckless when it comes to trades and free agency.

And although we realize that the Redskins' normal modus operandi is to trade pick for players who can contribute right now, our guess is that if they were able to deal Portis to the Pats, the next step would be to package one of the Pats' first-rounders, their own pick (fifth overall), and receiver Rod Gardner for a crack at the first overall pick and Pitt receiver Larry Fitzgerald.

All of this talk is premature, since the Broncos have not yet worked out a long-term deal with cornerback Champ Bailey. But that detail is expected to be addressed as soon as Monday, according to the Denver Post, when the tentative agreement with Bailey is reduced to writing and the trade is finalized.