QCity

my guess: 7yrs 105M 50M guaranteed.

If I've learned anything from this is that it's amazing how 1 random tweet spreads as "fact".

Nah Williams' agent is Ben Dogra.

Probably saw that Sabres game and ran for the hills.

Texans FB Vickers signed by Cowboys. The Texans don't seem to be chasing their guards Mike Brisel and Chris Myers, who are currently talking with other teams. Coupled with the release of T Eric Winston, it sure does look like they are dumping a lot of salary. Can't explain why a playoff team would potentially let 3 starting OL walk, unless they are making one last run at Mario.

He's a small receiver and I think someone will overpay for him. Not very enamored with him tbh.

His mother's sister was a black lab owned by Chad Kelly, so he's pretty wired in.

Odd, my dog is reporting a 6:30 time for the conference. He hasn't figured out Twitter yet however.

F5

Bucky Gleason Dont be surprised if #Bills sign Williams and wait till 5 pm or 6 pm to announce, so TVs can go live with breaking news. Bigger splash.

wow, Mario's fiancee is definitely NOT what I expected... http://bit.ly/U1fBW

TBH, I didn't understand why we were targeting him in the first place. His numbers are very low, especially for a season where his QB broke the yardage record.

I think he's right. Of course he was scheduled to meet with other teams, most high profile FA's say that. If he leaves town tomorrow without signing a contract, you're in serious denial if you think he's coming back. I hate to be a downer, but that's the reality of the situation as I see it.

Obviously, we did think we could sign him. And obviously, he was just using us for leverage. And it worked great for him, he got 6.5M a year which is a nice haul for a man with his stats.

If he gets back on the plane without signing, it's over.

"What the hell? This doesn't look like Chicago. What did you say your name was?"

If they sign him to a $100M deal I'm going to need a good cardiologist.

5yr 42.5M with 21M guaranteed? Wow that's wayyy overpriced for Garcon.

There's going to be about 5 gazillion "Ralph is cheap" posts if he signs...

VJax talking contract with the Bucs right now per espn.

He might get a layover on his way to Chicago.

dcjoev, Great post, but I'd like to clear up a few things. For the record, I've been involved in internet marketing in one form or the other since 1995 (yes, 1995 - an era when you could buy virtually any domain you wanted from Network Solutions for $100, and if you told people you had e-mail they though you were a scientist) This is my problem, you (and many, many others) seem to equate quantity with quality. The number of viewers a particular news article gets is not necessarily indicative of the quality or accuracy of the article. This doesn't just apply to websites, but rather all forms of media. By that logic the Twilight series should have been nominated for about 6 Oscars. American Idol packs them in. Would you consider that show to be the pinnacle of television? Internet marketing is all based on impressions i.e. how many pairs of eyeballs you can get on the page. It doesn't make a lick of difference if they agree or disagree with the article. It doesn't matter if the article is accurate and in most cases wildly inaccurate articles generate more traffic (see Walterfootball.com). It doesn't even really matter if they read it. They came to the page for a half second and ads were displayed. Insiders in internet marketing affectionately refer to sites like BR as "content mills" which operate by churning out as much content as possible to grab as much traffic as possible. Rather than have 1 page that gets 10 million visitors a day, these sites operate on the model of having 1 million pages that each get 10 visitors a day. Ever wonder why all those BR articles list "Top 20 Players Blah Blah" then make you click through 20 small 1-paragraph articles? Wouldn't it be easier to just list all 20 on one page and scroll down? Heh, 20 pages = 20 times the # of impressions and 20 more pages for the search engines. ESPN is firmly entrenched with espn.com. The majority of viewers don't arrive at espn.com from a search engine, they start at the main page and branch outward. BL on the other hand, (even with all it's traffic) is completely at the mercy of Google. Any minor change in Google's algorithm would have a massive effect on BR's traffic that would probably give the entire marketing department a nervous breakdown. I do respect writers that work hard to write accurate stories, and I'm sure BR has many of them. You said it yourself, it's tough to break into this business. But now it seems the best way to get noticed is to write sensational articles that "bait" fans into reading them. Take the March 12 article that starts out "Mike Wallace to Bills..." Now every fan in Pittsburgh and Buffalo is going to flock to read that. The problem is the article is complete bull ****. A fantasy dreamed up by a "featured columnist" that is about a 1000:1 shot. BR is in effect, trolling us! The sports fan in me just can't ever take this type of reporting seriously, however the marketer in me lauds BR with the highest of praise.

Yes, and the cash to cap number is the one we use!!! This is the number that determines if we can sign free agent X. This is how much we have to spend. And when we determine if can sign free agent X, we consider 100% of all bonuses applied toward this year, NOT amortized bonuses! See? It's just a simple example to illustrate the point of how bonuses are handled.. If you want a better one, look at Peppers' contract. He got like 1M his first year and 19M in bonuses. That would require 20M in free cash to cap space this year if we offered Mario the same deal. Whew, discussing the cap is tiring.

NOOOOOO! A cash to cap system DOES NOT amortize bonuses. Let's say Mario Williams wants 16M a year with a 20M signing bonus. The Bills will count all 36M of that amount against their cash to cap figure this year (of which they have at least $32M, probably a lot more as was stated). Now, the deal will be amortized under NFL rules and can easily be structed to fit under the cap, but that figure is meaningless because we aren't pressed up against the cap. Cash to cap ignores the amoritzation of NFL accounting, and that's the important number because that's what we have to spend.

and? My point was that they have to allot at least $15M for draft picks in their cash to cap system.