RoscoeParrish

Yes, they are. I don’t know how well-versed you are in the intricacies of the NBA, but most teams with reasonable ownership operate extremely close to the margins. For the 27-28 Bucks, they will have 4 players under contract in TOTAL and only $12M in cap space. They have to get to a roster of at least 13. Now they have access to mid level exceptions, but it’s basically a slot where they can’t pay anybody. Is it the worst thing in the world? No. Can they work around it? They are going to try. Is having basically a starter’s salary in dead money for the next 5 years objectively very bad for a small market franchise with a marquee superstar? Yes, of course. In a league with the most injuries, and the most to potentially lose with guaranteed contracts, yes I am arguing it would be bad for the NFL at large. It would be bad for the franchises and bad for the players and bad for the fans. Well, yeah. Players are getting asked to take pay cuts because they aren’t performing well enough. Their agents are evaluating the market and saying “no one else is going to pay you more than your requested pay cut, so you are better off taking it.” They aren’t just guessing. Josh Allen hasn’t been asked for a pay cut and won’t be as long as he keeps performing well. Dawson Knox and Von Miller have both taken pay cuts because their production hasn’t justified their salaries and they didn’t want to test their luck on the open market. Von is notably on the couch. Star took his paycut and was out the league. It’s not like they took a pay cut and got screwed out of a years salary because other teams wanted to pay him big bucks. To me, these statements are in conflict. How can teams be more careful in UFA and NOT be hesitant to spend? That seems to go hand in hand. And what players hit UFA? Not the superstars, they get locked up or tagged. It’s the NFL middle and lower classes who are desperately trying to get a $5M deal with $2.5M guaranteed. Guaranteeing contracts at this point in the NFL requires putting an entire guaranteed portion in escrow. We have seen teams like the Bengals and Cowboys be hesitant to pay their SUPERSTARS on time. The Bengals are notoriously cash poor. They have 37% of their cap tied up in QB and WR and it was a struggle to get there. Do you think having to dole out the other at least 63% in guarantees is going to be a problem? Of course it would be. And it would be a problem for the majority of the league. I don’t think folks realize how much money ISN’T guaranteed in the NFL. You can’t flip that switch and do a complete 180 without completely fundamentally altering the market and if you try, you will end up with a whole bunch of teams handing out league minimums left and right. If contracts are fully guaranteed, does a Devin Singletary type player get $5M on the market or league minimum? I think we all know the answer to that. I’m not viewing anyone as a problem. There is no problem. The players are making more money than ever. Threatening a strike to get guaranteed contracts that will ultimately, imo, harm the earnings of the vast majority of NFL players, is just bad business. Make less money with a shortened season and make less money overall is exactly what the NFLPA shouldn’t do.

I don’t think I agree. I talk to a lot of Chiefs fans. They weren’t really upset about the result of the Super Bowl. They said it sucked to watch, but they also had the “we’ve won 2 out of 3, it happens” mentality. “Whatever, we’ll be back next year,” is kind of the theme. Personally, I think if the Bills get annihilated in the Super Bowl like that in 2025, there will be figurative blood in the streets. It will not be “aw shucks, we will be back.” That’s just my opinion based on my experiences.

Different sport, but the Bucks have to pay Damian Lillard $20M annually over the next 5 years and the Suns are desperately trying to do the same with Bradley Beal to get out of their contracts which is likely going to cripple both franchises. And those combined $40M annual deals is $40M less to give to the other players. Do you think the NFLPA sees the Deshaun Watson contract and result as a win or a loss for their constituents? We are talking about a deal that would only happen for a handful of players at most The bottom line is that the cap keeps going up, the pay keeps going up. There’s more money in not stamping your feet about collusion and they recognize that.

Really? I feel like they are absolutely elated to have won a championship in recent history AND be in playoff contention every year. If you had to rank happiest fanbases over the last 5 years, it has to be Eagles, Chiefs, Bucs, Rams in any order, right? All 4 of those teams won a title recently and always make the playoffs and/or win playoff games. For the Rams, the end is near with Stafford’s age, but they were also a play away from beating the eventual SB champs. It’s not like their windows have snapped shut.

I think it’s been interesting to look at the Rams. Folks thought them loading up for multiple SB runs from 2018-2021 and jettisoning a lot of picks meant the dark days were coming. In fact, they saw 2022 as the beginning of the end with a 5 win record (Stafford was hurt). The facts of the matter is that the Rams both went “all in” and remained competitive. They had a down year once. But since 2017, that has been their only year with a losing record. Would the Rams have won any way if they didn’t trade all their picks? Maybe. But it’s bird in the hand. If our next 5 years look like the Rams last 5, I’d take it in about 2 seconds. 2-15 is not really on the table.

Is it the starters or including backups? really, you could start Fitz or Tyrod and see if you are gonna get the good or bad version of them, and if it’s not working, swap them out for the other guy. Feel like that extra wrinkle would keep it respectable. 40-24 for the fightin Josh Allen’s. edit: I see you saw if they played with McD they are ineligible, but imo Tyrod is a drought QB and always will be.

trends change for sure. i think the thing you have to think about is free agency. You don’t have 1 competitor, you have 31. And they are really dictating price of X guys, collectively. And the laws of nature means that bad players will always outnumber the good ones and the great ones will be far and few between. You can’t build a roster of B+ players making B+ money because there will always be teams willing to pay them A money to steal them away. Heck, the Bills lost guys like Gabe and Edmunds to that not too long ago. Water will find its level, like it always does. RBs are still devalued, just not crazily so. WRs will still get paid a ton, but maybe a little less in the future

How many players are affected by the franchise tag annually? 1? less than 1? It’s not a marquee issue and it definitely shouldn’t be. Players don’t care about the things fans think they care about. 99% of NFL players are willing to risk everything for a 1 year $30M deal fully guaranteed.

That’s why beane was ahead of the curve drafting a 1 year old Tremaine Edmunds

That would be the idea, but the history of the league is that the “middle class” and down gets squeezed when there’s a money shift. You are asking billionaires who largely don’t enjoy writing big checks to write bigger ones. And the notoriously cash poor ones would be looking to pinch money elsewhere and that paints a bulleyes on the market of the STer commanding $3M a season. For the 2011 CBA, the vets famously wanted the rookie scale implemented. They were sick of guys like Sam Bradford commanding large salaries without paying a snap. Their thought process was “if teams are paying rookies less, there is more money to pay us more.” What happened is that GMs couldn’t ignore that a second to 7th round rookie could reasonably fill in their spot for a fraction of the cost. And there was a real exodus of lower class vets out of the league. Why pay a backup DB or LB $2M when basically the entire rookie class will make less than them? This got so bad that they had to implement that the rule regarding LEAGUE MINIMUMS that scaled with years served had to be written so that the cap hit remained static while the cash paid remained incremental. To quote a famous saying, “my family can’t live in Good Intentions, Marge”

Making contracts more guaranteed will almost certainly hurt the vast majority of players. It’s a zero sum salary cap league. The more money dedicated to the Josh Allen’s is less money for the Darrick Forests. Guess how many of those guys there are in the league? The point of unions is to represent the overall player interests. Not just the superstars. And a good union should try to maintain a positive relationship with the overlying company. Being pointlessly contentious for posturing is just that. They should be a partner with a seat at the table to get things done for their constituents.

The dog days of 2016 were some of the toughest weeks to watch. in the last 25 years, I have probably missed 4 or 5 Bills games and 3 of them may be from that year.

Reputationally around the league, I think Taron gets more respect but I think Benford was much better last year. just like any list though, it’s a popularity contest. Ramsey will be super high despite his play on the field not supporting it.

FWIW, 2019 wasn’t that pass happy and there are a fair amount of similarities, including the best WR on the team being a very good slot guy.

It’s not really trying to twist your words. Isn’t the point of Cover 2 making those throws low probability? By having an extra deep defender, who maybe makes the offense hold the ball a second or two late on a throw, in time for the pass rush to get home? Isn’t the best way to strategically beat Cover 2 to be methodical and take open checkdowns aka what the defense gives you? I feel like you really argued against yourself here, strategically and statistically. Offense was a second a late, pass rush got home, incomplete.