Steve Smith

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Kirwan calls him this year's Laverneous Coles.

 

Steve Smith meet Dan Synder

 

He doesn't want to be the 2nd option in Washington...

 

All of this talk makes me think of the Cota free agency a few years ago and how we kind of got burned by it. By that I mean, if we had matched the Saints offer even with all of Cota's incentives that we built into their contract (the Saints), we probably would've been in good shape since he and the team never reached those incentives when the Saints offered him that loaded contract.

I know, that probably didn't make any sense. All I remember from that fiasco was that the Aints tried to stick it to us by offering Cota a sticky contract that we couldn't match, when if we had matched it, wouldn't have been sticky because the Aints and Cota never reached those incentives. I guess what I'm trying to say is, we could've kept Cota and not been hurt.

I'm kind of afraid that some team will try to do that with Steve Smith and we'll lose him. But, Marty indicated that they were going to try to sign him quickly so it wouldn't drag on with a holdout. I keep telling myself to have faith in Fox and Hurney. They haven't steered us wrong yet. After all, we got to that stupid, worthless, pissant game called the uh.., uh..., what was it again? Oh, yeah the Super Bowl.

Just have faith in those two. Just remember-- we went from 1-15 two years ago to the Super Bowl this year. IN HURNEY WE TRUST! (And don't forget Fox, too!)

 

The bottom line was that Chad Cota was a somewhat limited strong safety on a team that already had picked out its strong safety in Minter. At the time, Mike was playing free, and shouldn't have been. It wasn't so much that Cota was that great, we just didn't plan and we didn't replace him well. At the time it was a very high contract for that level player and it ended up costing the Saints pretty good once he earned those incentives and bolted.

 

I think one of the incentives was if the Defense finished in the top 10, Cota could cut the deal short. That year the Saints was near the bottom in defense, Panthers were already at the top. We expected to be in the top 10 the following year and couldn't agree to the new contract. Saints got him. Incentives were met and it ended up being a short stay with the Saints. All of this is from memory but I think it is fairly accurate.

The NFL may have changed the rules regarding some of the poison pills the teams were negotiating. I was told so in another thread.

Addition: My opinion is to go with the high tender, a first and a third ain't bad for a guy with baggage. I like Smith, I think he is our playmaker but you can't overpay. Gilbert would have been perceived as a better player at a lower salary (JMHO).

 

Exactly - but the problem occurred well before free agency ever started. We dicked around and tried to play the tender game, instead of getting a new contract to Cota during the season. If we had done that since, as Mags correctly pointed out, he wasn't star material, we would have had him for a reasonable amount.

Now we come to Smith, and we are in the process of making the same mistake. I have no idea why Steve didn't get a new contract months ago, but it's gonna cost us one way or another now - either we lose a lot of cap money, or we lose Smith.

 

Should be able to get a contract done this month, to avoid that. Or so the hope is. We've got the cap space to do it, anyway.
Just can't let the team concept become the Smith concept.

 

Thanks for helping me out. It was a jillion years ago and I couldn't remember the specifics of it. I just remember that we messed up.

 

I'm not trying to follow all these finances, as its a bit overwhelming for me, and it sounds from what you say that it is a mute point anyway; but, if it comes down to one of them, I'd rather keep Smith. I don't see that Moose needs to retire here. When looking at keeping either of them, it's not like we can't win without anymore than marginal receivers. I have to agree with Mag that if the price for Smith makes sense go for it but I wouldn't want to overpay for a guy whose head could come back to be major problems. I worry that Smith has controlled himself this year with the incentive of this being a contract year and that he could easily return to bad form ... it seems to be his nature. On the other hand, if he can/does continue to control his temper then he still has lots of upside and could be one helluva receiver ... but it looks to me like a pretty risky gamble that I don't take unless the price is attractive or you can put something in the contract that would protect you from him becoming ass again. I don't lose any sleep if we lose him.

Who are the high draft picks you are referring to? I was thinking that Tuten was kinda penciled in there and we got Willig late in desperation. I agree with the poster that thinks an upgrade at backup tackle needs to be a priority. Me thinks we were damn lucky after Tuten went down to not have another injury at the position.