Einstein's Dog

This is a made up myth that keeps being repeated. How do you know how the Bills wouldn't have taken Lamar? We do know the Bills weren't satisfied with what they had at QB even after making the playoffs. If you put Lamar and D Henry on the current Bills they would still be favorites to win the AFCE.

Cap figures are not all that Matter! The substance of the transaction matters!! Eventually the substance must be accounted for. You can manipulate individual years but eventually the cap needs to be considered. Baltimore clearly manipulated the 2024 cap figure for D Henry because they were probably tight to the cap. They gave Henry the $7,790,000 signing bonus but manipulated the cap figure to only be $5M. The difference must be accounted for in the future. The substance of the transaction, the $16M matters, because Balt is going to have to account for it in the future. This is like you saying "oh, they're paying D Henry a lot because the cap figure is $13M this year". No, they are making up some of what they hadn't claimed the year before. The amount to D Henry had always been paying him $16M for 2 years.

Two seasons in a row like what? An exciting 1,000 rushing, +300 yds receiving, who plays 50% of the snaps? Someone is going to give $15-17M for that? When was the last time that happened? Cook may mean more to the Bills than some other teams because of the lack of other explosive weapons. So Beane might be tempted to overpay and tag Cook - but I'm not sure, remember Beane let D Henry go to Balt for under $10M. And the more Cook slides into Diggs type territory the less likely it becomes.

You are bolding the cap figures. We've been trying to tell you those are extremely manipulative. D Henry had a $7,790,000 signing bonus for 2024, with $9M guaranteed. D Henry received more money than what Balt used for a cap hit - those are the games you can play with the cap. This year D Henry will get the remaining portion of the $16M (don't get confused by what they do with the cap).

Yes, it was $8M/yr for D Henry. Cap numbers can be manipulated. The first year was not a "prove-it" year. From Spotrac: Derrick Henry signed a 2 year, $16,000,000 contract with the Baltimore Ravens, including $7,790,000 signing bonus, $9,000,000 guaranteed, and an average annual salary of $8,000,000. In 2025, Henry will earn a base salary of $6,000,000 and a roster bonus of $1,000,000, while carrying a cap hit of $12,895,000 and a dead cap value of $4,895,000. Cook does not want to be paid for what he has done, he wants market price for what he thinks he could do. Cook has 2 season with about 1,000 yds rushing and 300 receiving. This is C Hubbard/D Swift/D Henry $8.5M/yr territory. Putting up a season like he did last year does not get Cook to $17m, let alone making it worth tagging him. $17M? What are you thinking?

I do want to backstep a bit and reiterate that I think Cook is an exciting RB. He has really come on and IMO is close to top 5. While everyone seems to dread the Lamar/D Henry combo I thought there was a little disrespect to the Josh/Cook dynamic - it's that much of a factor. I would prefer an extension, and for more years than several on this thread (just not at $15M/yr). I think the 200ish carries will preserve Cook and he has several good years left. Unfortunately I guess I don't like seeing the negotiations playing out in front of me. It makes me fear things have gone South.

I think you will see that this is also the opinion of Beane. But at least the odds are we get Cook this year - and if Cook hasn't peaked- maybe franchise tag him the year after.

McD thought different personnel were better suited to play on the critical drive at crunch time than Cook. That does not reflect well on Cook. You call it a clear mistake that Cook wasn't out there but yet you don't know why. I don't know why McD did not have Cook out there, but I'm extremely confident McD wanted to win. And McD thought his best way to win at that time was with different players than Cook out there. While Spotrac is just one service giving their evaluation at $10.2M, it should help some understand why many think the $15M claim was ridiculous.

I think the D Swift comparisons are more about the stats - the worth of a somewhat young player who has 200 carries, 1,000ish yds + approx 40 receptions for 300 yds with a good OL in front of them. Swift got 3yrs $24M with $15M guaranteed. Spotrac has J Cook's market value listed at $10.2M/yr (4yrs $40.8M).

How about we just look at the market price of a 200 carry 1,000 yd-ish back - (+ 50 rec for 300 yds) because that is what he has been, and that is the role the Bills have in mind for him. And that is not a $15M role. The useless bit of information about Cook's relative usage on our team is irrelevant. Without Cook someone else would be the second most productive player. And if that player got 200 carries and around 1,000 yards they too would not get $15M, no matter how exciting they look doing it. While you can downplay the 2 v 3 downs, you don't mention Cook not being out there during the crunch drive vs KC. Lets not pretend the coaches didn't want their best personnel out there - and Cook was not on the field. A $15M player should be out there in crunch time.

To me it's a ridiculous amount, and I think to most fans it looks unreasonable - at the time it was $3M more than Barkley. And it's beyond the top end of the 2 down RB market. It signifies Cook wants to be paid at the top tier of the 3 down workhorse RB market - which he is not currently in (thus the Shakir example). I still can't figure out why Cook's team put that out there - what good did they think could come from it. As for social media games, the Diggs thing turned the Bills fanbase against him. And Poyer's wasn't much better, seemingly orchestrated by his wife.

Who? What other Bills player put out a ridiculous amount they wanted to get paid? I didn't hear about it but I don't have active accounts of all players. Seems like all the other Bills players quietly got deals done.

What other Bills player put out anything similar? And lets not forget his brother's nonsense, or putting the house up for sale. Cook's been quiet now, maybe because they let him look into trade/pay partners and found it to be limited. Cook has been an exciting 2 down back, in the top tier of those. Close to D Henry ($8M) level. Shakir is also an exciting WR. But he is a slot WR so he got paid at the slot level, not at the DK Metcalf level. Cook is a 2 down back that appears to want to be paid like a 3 down workhorse back. I don't think the Bills plan on using him like that, or paying him like that. For me, there's no love lost on the business side of this now. Play Cook at his bargain $5M (and if he doesn't show - fine him). Then next year you have the decision of whether or not to franchise tag him. They wanted hardball, they got it. Beane can do this while saying the whole time "How he loves J Cook and J Cook means everything to this team".

Sometimes it's the way people go about things. I don't begrudge Cook for trying to get paid, but I don't need to hear about it. What good did going on social media do him? For the most part, it just made Cook look overly greedy - a ridiculous amount of an ask ($15M). How did they expect the Bills fanbase to react? No, I don't want Beane to give in to what look like the petulant demands of a greedy team (Cook/brother/agent). The other 4-5 draft players were able to quietly get decent deals done. And $8-$10M isn't chump change - if they weren't idiots that amount could set them up for life. It seems like a good sign that the Bills FO didn't draft an RB, meaning they expect Cook to play. Seems we'll need to take it year by year with Cook.

The reason you quibble is because there is a salary cap. If you overpay for an RB there will be less funds for other positions. I would have rather the cap allocation went to DK Metcalf instead of an RB. Secondly, from a longer term perspective it's a bad look for the FO to be perceived to have given in to the demands of a squeaky wheel (see Dallas Cowboys). The way the FO negotiates has brought excellent deals with most of the good drafted players, making an exception will make future negotiations more difficult. Third, many people here are not placing the value of Cook for what he has done, but rather for what he could be. Cook's stats are at best, at the level of D Henry, $8M a year. Upstream people are saying he should be in the tier of Jacobs, Kamara, or A Jones - yet Cook has never put up those kind of numbers.