Franchise Tag and Draft Picks

[Mikie2times]

As a team that spends less, has a below average winning %, and rates low in the sexy city factor, it is very frustrating to see a player we drafted and developed let go with nothing in return. In most cases this team is not going to acquire elite talent via free agency, Mario was a major exception, but typically we go for value guys in free agency, then we acquire our real talent in the draft. Drafts in which our recent record accurately reflects our ability to evaluate talent (we don't do a fantastic job at it). This all makes losing a guy like Byrd or other home grown talents even more frustrating. He's a guy we did a great job with in our draft selection and in development, since we lack pools of money, win%, and sexiness we lose a lot of the better selections we make. Almost every time we lose a player in a similar situation as Byrd we hear the same comments.

 

Why didn't we get something for him in return?

 

Since it's such a readily used statement hear I was wondering if anybody had any basis for making such a statement. Is it common practice to leverage a a franchised player and acquire draft picks for him? Better stated, what % of franchised players are traded for draft pick compensation. I have no idea what the answer to this is but I would be inclined to think it's rather low. Probably less then 10% maybe even less then 5%. I don't think it happens very frequently just based on the nature of the situation. Usually a franchised player seeking exile will hold out on the first tag, it's the second tag in which things unravel. If the player is hell bent on hitting the market at that point, literally hell bent, is a tag/trade a good position to be in? As a team you take on the league wide impression that you're not very player friendly in negotiation something maybe an elite team can afford but not one with so many chips against them. On top of that you lower your bargaining position by a large margin as teams know you basically just signed a time bomb for a sign a trade, they have no problem letting you hold that bomb as long as possible. Best case scenario, in the majority of the cases, you either get marginal compensation or the trade never happens and you have a guy that you don't want playing for you an entire year (because he clearly doesn't want to play for you). I know we like to indulge in the Monday Morning QB talks, I just think this tag and trade concept so readily used is better served for Madden vs the real NFL.

Edited March 12, 2014 by KzooMike

[Dr. Fong]

In hindsight it would have been nice to use the tag to leverage a trade for Graham.

[Ed_Formerly_of_Roch]

Add to that it's very easy for the tagged player to tell the team who tagged him he won't talk to or agree to any contracts with any teams. I can't see any team offering picks or anything for a tagged player unless he'll agree to an extension.

 

Take Byrd as an example, maybe he had a half dozen teams he would talk to . If one of them were to work out a potential deal with Buffalo maybe he talks to them, but there's little incentive for those teams to agree to trade draft picks as they know Buffalo's only other option would be to release him. And if your team is on the list of teams he's not interested in going to and won't talk with them, then unlikely to get anything for him.

 

Couple that with the fact that the player can hold out all the way to game #10 and still get full credit for the year, really a kick in the a** to the team who tags him. Meanwhile they have to keep all that money available in case he does sign the tag.

 

System does make it tough to tag and trade. That is one rule I'd love to see changed that players have to be there from game #1 on to get credit for season.