cåblelady Posted February 20, 2005 Share Posted February 20, 2005 Maybe it's a good thing we don't have a 1st this year? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
AKC Posted February 20, 2005 Share Posted February 20, 2005 Maybe it's a good thing we don't have a 1st this year? 246462[/snapback] That's surely a conclusion you might reach even if you acknowledge BadOl/DC Tom and Todd's point that draft slotting simply makes the GMs "decision" on his contract offer to the high pick less a negotiation than a hostage demand. A GM's contract skills can be scrutinized very accurately by the contract offers made to players resigning, players renogotiating and players signing on in Free Agency, but in the area of contact negotiation it's hardly fair to hold a GM over the coals on the initial contracts of early round draft picks. The reality of slotting due in part to the rookie cap simply make the deals too cookie cutter and IMO less debatable as far as the wisdom of the original deals. You can argue the pick, but the deal is far less arguable. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Estro Posted February 20, 2005 Share Posted February 20, 2005 I still find it hard to believe that there is a possibility Mike Williams cap hit this season could be $9+ million. How could the Bills organization ever construct a contract that even enabled the possibility for a RT to make $9 million for one season? Exactly that's why I'm not buying it. The elite left tackles in the game ala Walter Jones don't even have cap figures this large. If this is true, the Bills need to look at what type of escalators there putting into the contracts because $9 million is way too much for a guy who still hasnt proved he can play LT or even dominate at the RT position thus far. For $9 million we could get a decent tackle and a stud guard (Shelton, and Rivera, DeMulling, or Mayberry). I know that would never happen, but I'm just saying that to show how that big of a contract will prevent us from going out and getting key FA's. Also if this increase is due to escalators, what were the escalators has he achieved? He hasn't played a down at LT, nor has he made the Pro Bowl. I can't imagine that an escalator would simply be games started. Basically I really hope all of this is false because if we do owe him that type of money it's absolutely ludicrous and will it will prevent us from upgrading in other areas. Big Mike better take a big pay cut if it is true, but like I said I won't believe this cap hit until its actually put out or mentioned by the Bills. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
DC Tom Posted February 20, 2005 Share Posted February 20, 2005 I still find it hard to believe that there is a possibility Mike Williams cap hit this season could be $9+ million. How could the Bills organization ever construct a contract that even enabled the possibility for a RT to make $9 million for one season? Exactly that's why I'm not buying it. The elite left tackles in the game ala Walter Jones don't even have cap figures this large. If this is true, the Bills need to look at what type of escalators there putting into the contracts because $9 million is way too much for a guy who still hasnt proved he can play LT or even dominate at the RT position thus far. For $9 million we could get a decent tackle and a stud guard (Shelton, and Rivera, DeMulling, or Mayberry). I know that would never happen, but I'm just saying that to show how that big of a contract will prevent us from going out and getting key FA's.Also if this increase is due to escalators, what were the escalators has he achieved? He hasn't played a down at LT, nor has he made the Pro Bowl. I can't imagine that an escalator would simply be games started. Basically I really hope all of this is false because if we do owe him that type of money it's absolutely ludicrous and will it will prevent us from upgrading in other areas. Big Mike better take a big pay cut if it is true, but like I said I won't believe this cap hit until its actually put out or mentioned by the Bills. 246500[/snapback] As has been pointed out...when you're talking about a #4 pick, there's not a whole lot of negotiation involved. Most of the negotiations for high first round picks that I can recall are mostly about the length of the contract - 4, 5, or 6 years - with little movement on dollar value. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
seq004 Posted February 20, 2005 Share Posted February 20, 2005 I am a fan of the moves TD has made wrt free agency. As for the draft, I am not very impressed, but I suppose it IS early. The whole MW thing has been a fiasco so far. It needs to be resolved. 246314[/snapback] I totally agree Bill. I think he's done very well in free agency, but like Pittsburg his drafts are not all that good. He did well in 2001 and taking a chance on Willis but the 2002 draft is a disaster. The Vikings also have a big dissapointment with Mckinnie so it wasn't like we should have taken him but he totally whiffed at Reed and Denny. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
d_wag Posted February 20, 2005 Share Posted February 20, 2005 Right here, baby. He signed a rookie contract that was slotted per position and there is littel wiggle room in that. I challenge you to find an argument as to how rookie contracts could be changed. Go ahead. Give it your best shot. 246406[/snapback] how about a one tier bonus vs. the two tier bonus that donahoe gave him? how about bigger salaries in the first few years of the deal and smaller escalators in the back end? both of these moves would have allowed the bills to space out the cap hit more evenly......donahoe made a choice to backend the deal........ Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Snorom Posted February 20, 2005 Share Posted February 20, 2005 how about a one tier bonus vs. the two tier bonus that donahoe gave him? how about bigger salaries in the first few years of the deal and smaller escalators in the back end? both of these moves would have allowed the bills to space out the cap hit more evenly......donahoe made a choice to backend the deal........ 246540[/snapback] Front loading MW's contract would have changed the team. We wouldn't have had the cap room to sign a few of the palyers we did. The multi tiered bonus protect the Bills in case a player is a complete bust or has a career ending injury. smaller esculators would be fine, but a#4 draft pick has expectation to the amount of money they would expect to be able to make through the lifetime of the deal based upon thise drafted in front of them and in back of them, and the contracts of picks from previous years. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Stussy109 Posted February 20, 2005 Share Posted February 20, 2005 I personally do not believe this. The man is still in his rookie contract, and word is his base salary will be higher than that of a premier LT in his 2nd contract out of Free agency. Very hard to believe. It would be easier to believe if he had made the pro bowl, and hit an escalator clause. But a rookie's contract jumping from say a salary of 4million to 9 million due to healthy starts, I doubt it. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
d_wag Posted February 20, 2005 Share Posted February 20, 2005 Front loading MW's contract would have changed the team. We wouldn't have had the cap room to sign a few of the palyers we did. The multi tiered bonus protect the Bills in case a player is a complete bust or has a career ending injury. smaller esculators would be fine, but a#4 draft pick has expectation to the amount of money they would expect to be able to make through the lifetime of the deal based upon thise drafted in front of them and in back of them, and the contracts of picks from previous years. 246548[/snapback] did we make the playoffs in the past 4 years? we obviously didn't need them that bad, seeing they couldn't get us over the hump.......now if we took bigger hits on williams' contract back then we'd have more room to make a run this year.......it was a choice, and the wrong one......... i understand williams had a number in mind of what he wanted to earn over the life of the deal.........the key is he didn't care how it hit the cap........he obviously would have welcomed bigger salaries in the first few years and would have taken smaller escalators to get his money up front......... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
cåblelady Posted February 20, 2005 Share Posted February 20, 2005 how about bigger salaries in the first few years of the deal and smaller escalators in the back end? 246540[/snapback] I think big Mike needs a smaller salary and a bigger escalator for his big back end. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
obie_wan Posted February 20, 2005 Share Posted February 20, 2005 2002 was the year TD should have traded down for a 1st and a 2nd. The Jints picked 14th and took Jeremy Shockey and WR Tim Carter in the 2nd. Hell, Denver took Clinton Portis in the 2nd that year at #19. Remember the "Miracle Worker" Anne Sullivan, oops - Jim McNally was OL coach in NY. Don't you think the Jints would have taken McKinnie or MW at #4. Yes they would have. And, they'd have been very smug about it too. Yeah, yeah, yeah. OL was a NEED in 2002. Well, guess what? It's STILL a need. Fat Boy Mike hasn't been the Be-all, End-all answer. We could have paid some other tackling sled a lot less than what we're giving him - and we'd have a TE with an attitude and another quality player. Should'a traded down, I say. Should'a traded down. 246401[/snapback] agree that the proper move would have been to trade down, even if it meant giving away the pick for little value to do so. The Bills should have taken Mike Pearson from UF to play LT in the 2nd round. This also would have prevented the questions surrounding Josh Reed Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
billsfaninnyc Posted February 20, 2005 Share Posted February 20, 2005 where is the 9.17 million figure from? i havent seen anything even close to that in the media.... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Fake-Fat Sunny Posted February 20, 2005 Share Posted February 20, 2005 agree that the proper move would have been to trade down, even if it meant giving away the pick for little value to do so. The Bills should have taken Mike Pearson from UF to play LT in the 2nd round. This also would have prevented the questions surrounding Josh Reed 246580[/snapback] Yeah but hindsight is 20/20 and woulda, coulda, shoulda. If Reed had not been taken how free would we have felt to let Peerless go and the Peerless trade yielded a 1st rounder who turned out to be Willis McGahee. The second guessing is fine because afterall we're just fans and this is just the internet, but I think all of the second guessing (which I have invested in myself on issues like what we would have used the 1st and the 4th for if we had not made the trade for RJ I'm proud to say I advocated using them for Tra Thomas and Tim Dwight long before these two were stars, but even these flights of fancy came with the proper caveats that these suggestions meant little in hindsight) must come with the appropriate acknowledgement that the best arguments for these views is based on hindsight. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
d_wag Posted February 20, 2005 Share Posted February 20, 2005 I'm proud to say I advocated using them for Tra Thomas and Tim Dwight long before these two were stars246588[/snapback] tim dwight a "star"? i think you exaggarate...... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Bill from NYC Posted February 20, 2005 Author Share Posted February 20, 2005 PROVE IT!!! according to the latest figures, the bills are approx. $14 m under the cap. you think that aint enough under the cap to sign a prominant FA??? well, if it aint, then how much under do the bills have to be to grab a "prominant" FA? granted the cap numbers are ridiculous for a RT, and even worse an underachieving RT.... but, let's face it, that's the price you have to pay for a #4 pick. Most every Bills fan supported the drafting of MW... who should the bills have taken, McKinnie??? If Mike Williams turns out to be a bust, it's no one elses's fault but his own... all of the scouting done on him league wide had him in the top 7. 246441[/snapback] OK. I am sure that my choice of words was incorrect. Even if the Bills are 14 mil under the cap (which is heavily disputed by clumping platelets), a 9.17 million dollar cap hit.....more than 10% of what the entire franchise is allowed to spend, would in fact prevent the Bills from signing Hasselback, or another highly sought after free agent because there are other needs, and we have our own ufas to sign. >>>>>If Mike Williams turns out to be a bust, it's no one elses's fault but his own... all of the scouting done on him league wide had him in the top 7.<<<<< Not true. Mike Williams did not draft himself, nor did he give himself this type of obscene money. He was drafted by TD, and TD gave him the money. I am fairly happy with TD as a GM, but let's not absolve him from responsibility for any moves that go bad, shall we? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Fake-Fat Sunny Posted February 20, 2005 Share Posted February 20, 2005 where is the 9.17 million figure from? i havent seen anything even close to that in the media.... 246582[/snapback] Just clarify and not to assert, I think these numbers come from: 1. A $4 million MW base pay for 2005 according to NFL.com which can be found soecifically at > http://www.nflpa.org/media/playerProfile.asp?ID=32980 < which is his individual profile of this web site. This number is relatively trustworthy as this number represents what the NFL and NFLPA are reporting to each other and if this is wrong one of them lied to the other and broke the trust the CBA is based on. This is double-checked because this is the NFLPA reporting to its members and the press and if it lied to them there would be hell to pay. This number is the fact as best as I can tell and represents a rise in MWs bas salary from a previously reported $726,000 to $4 million. 2. A prorated allocation of about $2.1 million from the original bonus of $12+ million MW received as the bonus he was entitled to from his draft position due to slotting. The $12+ million was prorated over the 5 year length of the original deal though MW has already pocketed the money. 3. A bonus payment due to MW of $3 million at some point prior to the cap casualty date (6/1) and probably prior to the draft this year (Bledsoe's escalator for example was due 3/22). These escalators are agreed to by the players and the owner essentially as a tool to force these contracts to be subjected to the free market. Clumpy has been great enough to do the work to ferret out these numbers amd I have little reason to doubt him but I do not know where this number comes from. It makes a huge difference in terms of an actual deal getting done, but actually does not make a difference in terms of what the Bills should do because even a $5.1 million cap hit (the base salary and prorated bonus I can publicly see) is a lot more than MW deserves from his prior play and is more than the Bills should pay MW to play RT and they should do the same thing of restructuring the deal whether the total is $6.1 million or $9.1 million. Further, regardless of which amount is correct, the combination of the MW cap hit with resigning JJ to amount of $5 million or more would likely make it exceed the Bills OL budget to get more talent at LG. This is what I know and what I think regarding MW's salary and I would love to be corrected with more factual numbers and links to them. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
clumping platelets Posted February 20, 2005 Share Posted February 20, 2005 Your chart as of 1/14/05 says MW is a $5,896,875 cap hit for 05. Which info is correct? 246443[/snapback] Use link in my sig Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
clumping platelets Posted February 20, 2005 Share Posted February 20, 2005 Again, the $14.8 million under number that some have was BEFORE NFLPA had changed the salaries on their website after these players achieved their escalators. The increase in salaries have taken slightly more than $5 million off everyone's numbers but some HAVE updated their cap pages and others have not. No indictment on those who haven't...I was fortunate to have the time to make the changes. If you go to the sticky threads at the top (Salary cap status of all 32 teams), I mentioned Mike Williams' escalator back in January. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Bill from NYC Posted February 20, 2005 Author Share Posted February 20, 2005 Again, the $14.8 million under number that some have was BEFORE NFLPA had changed the salaries on their website after these players achieved their escalators. The increase in salaries have taken slightly more than $5 million off everyone's numbers but some HAVE updated their cap pages and others have not. No indictment on those who haven't...I was fortunate to have the time to make the changes.If you go to the sticky threads at the top (Salary cap status of all 32 teams), I mentioned Mike Williams' escalator back in January. 246654[/snapback] CP, thanks for doing so much work, and providing us with numbers. On TBD, we are fanatics, and salary cap issues matter a great deal. Please disregard the disrespectful statement from the one particular moderator who likes to dish out insults, sometimes personal insults at that, while bringing oh so little to the table. He would rather threaten to ban you than talk about football, and clearly does NOT put the effort into his work that do you. Thanks again. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
clumping platelets Posted February 20, 2005 Share Posted February 20, 2005 CP, thanks for doing so much work, and providing us with numbers. On TBD, we are fanatics, and salary cap issues matter a great deal. Please disregard the disrespectful statement from the one particular moderator who likes to dish out insults, sometimes personal insults at that, while bringing oh so little to the table. He would rather threaten to ban you than talk about football, and clearly does NOT put the effort into his work than do you. Thanks again. 246673[/snapback] Thanks I've become used to the criticism......I wish the Bills had more cap space as well, it truly makes the off-season more exciting. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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