Leverage

[The Senator]

But, think about it. Under your "possible" scenario, the Bills would be paying Peters about $3.8 Million to not show up, this year (pro-rated for missed games), $3.4 Mill to not show up or contribute next year, and then reward him with the average of the top five LTs in the game ($12-$13 Million, by then?), the following year.

 

Hell, if you or I were Peters, that would be our dream deal.

Hey, I'm ready to sign right now!

 

Seriously, though, where'd you get those #'s? I don't think $3.8M for 6 games is accurate. (If it is, he's already making over $10M/year, and we know he's not.)

 

Also, he'd never see the $12-13M/year after we slap the tag on him - he'd be two years older, terribly rusty and out-of-shape from not playing, and we'd just trade him at that point.

[The Dean]

Hey, I'm ready to sign right now!

 

Seriously, though, where'd you get those #'s? I don't think $3.8M for 6 games is accurate. (If it is, he's already making over $10M/year, and we know he's not.)

 

Also, he'd never see the $12-13M/year after we slap the tag on him - he'd be two years older, terribly rusty and out-of-shape from not playing, and we'd just trade him at that point.

 

 

The numbers left on his current contract are 3.8 and 3.4 respectively. So, if he holds out of TC and preseason, but shows up sometime during the season, that's what he gets paid (but, as I noted pro-rated, and minus fines, perhaps). If they slap the tag on him, he'll get the money.

[The Senator]

The numbers left on his current contract are 3.8 and 3.4 respectively. So, if he holds out of TC and preseason, but shows up sometime during the season, that's what he gets paid (but, as I noted pro-rated, and minus fines, perhaps). If they slap the tag on him, he'll get the money.

Ah, I see - you could have just said...

"Under your "possible" scenario, the Bills would be paying Peters about $1.4 Million to not show up this year, $1.3 Million to not show up or contribute next year, minus about $700K/year in fines, leaving him around $700K this year and $600K next year - before taxes and agents' fees, of course, which would then leave him roughly $400K/year or less."

 

(All of a sudden, doesn't sound like such a vast amount - barely enough to cover your or my bar bill, actually. )

[billsfan_34]

The Bills have to be careful about playing around with contracted players. Peters's ego gets bruised easily and obviously he is looking for alot more coin because he is a probowler, so there is a demand for those types of players.

 

I would plan on Peters getting a big raise and coming into camp happy.

Let his ego get bruised. Are we going to constantly re work this guys contract. We already did once, and now we offered a pretty fat contract again. Not bad for someone undrafted. I, like you, want the Bills to be succesful. But The brass should refuse to be held hostage by him. I say let him sit and rot. So they have to pay him at the tenth game. He still will lose a boatload of money. Just my two cents though.

[billsfreak]

If he reports by game 10, he gets paid (pro rated) for the year, and it counts as a year of service.. He would also. likely be fined for missing camp and such.

 

The whole thing is ridiculous, of course, but was in response to this:

 

Not sure about that Deano - if he shows flashes of brilliance after holding out, we might just make him play out his contract, then slap the franchise tag on him.

 

I was simply pointing out some of the realities in that scenario.

True, but I think he only gets the money for the games he is there, which kind defeats his whole argument. Coming in by the 10th game gives him an entire year for FA purposes, but that is usually a tactic used when a player is in their final year on a contract, so I don't think it will come to that. I truly think he will either resign or be traded before the season starts, if not before training camp even starts. I wouldn't be surprised if one or the other happens by the draft.

[KollegeStudnet]

If it does come down to it...and this is scary...the coaching staff has been praising Chambers or Bell this offseason, which makes me wonder....

 

If Peters does get traded...Walker would most definitely move to LT...while Chambers and Bell fight it out for RT...

 

I wish it was different, but we all know this Front Office...

 

If the Bills do get two first round picks this year (one from Philly if Peters is traded), than those picks will go to OLB/DE or Safety

[Mr. WEO]

Nate Clements wanted insane money form the Bills. He was a Pro Bowler. They watched him walk away. A very stupid organization paid him the insane money. Happens frequently.

 

 

It shouldn't matter to us how another team values a player. In fact, it's overwhelmingly clear that JP is overvalued so it would be in our best interest to exploit that and cash in. Maybe there is another morbidly obese TE out there who can be taught how to play 14 games or so a year at LT.

 

As for claiming the NFL is not a "true free market"------for practical purposes, it pretty much is. But there have to be contracts or there would be no league. Are you suggesting that at any time, any player should be able to "get" his free market value? How would that work? Everyone has a one year contract? No contract? Is every player always, at any time available to the next higher payer?

 

Without the ability of a team to sign a player to a long-term contract, over time, no team would pay anybody big dollars if they were just renting them for a year.

 

And stop with the "we won't win games without Peters" nonsense. First, he's just not that good, and, if in the real world Peters was the best LT in the league, nothing would have much changed last year anyway.

[Sisyphean Bills]

Also, he'd never see the $12-13M/year after we slap the tag on him - he'd be two years older, terribly rusty and out-of-shape from not playing, and we'd just trade him at that point.

Who's the trade partner? Gino at Rosario's Pizzeria?

 

Nobody is going to trade good value for a guy that's held out 3 years running. They know you've got a white hot poker up your arse and aren't going to help you out one iota.

Nate Clements wanted insane money form the Bills. He was a Pro Bowler. They watched him walk away. A very stupid organization paid him the insane money. Happens frequently.

Nate Clements wanted the best deal he could get on the open market. The fact that some other teams were willing to give him a big signing bonus and a back loaded contract that had an impressive total dollar amount wasn't under Clements direct control. The "insane" adjective is your own manifestation; he got the best deal he could and took advantage of the Bills stupidity to not protect their investment. Yes, the Bills front office, Marv Levy specifically, foolishly said, "Sure, OK, whatever you want to do, Nate." They let him hit free agency without protecting their own interests.

 

It's rather comical that fans are so protective of Ralph Wilson's largess. Indeed, he has to spend his portion of the skyrocketing salary cap on some players. The number of players on a team hasn't changed, so the ever inflating pool of money has to be thrown at someone per the rules of the CBA. And people wring their hands over whether a delta of $1M or $2M per year is "insane" in a contract negotiation. You're fighting the wrong fight. You're should really be pissed at the system. The system has never been completely fair nor are players wrong to capitalize when wheelbarrows full of money are being tossed around like confetti at New Year's.

[stuckincincy]

Who's the trade partner? Gino at Rosario's Pizzeria?

 

Nobody is going to trade good value for a guy that's held out 3 years running. They know you've got a white hot poker up your arse and aren't going to help you out one iota.

 

 

So true...

[The Senator]

Who's the trade partner? Gino at Rosario's Pizzeria?

 

Nobody is going to trade good value for a guy that's held out 3 years running. They know you've got a white hot poker up your arse and aren't going to help you out one iota.

You're right - at that point his NFL career would likely be over. He'd so freakin' fat and out-a-shape, he'd resemble...

 

[macaroni]

I wonder ........... if we would have offered him a long term deal at around 8mil/year last year when he originally asked for a new contract, would he have snapped up the opportunity????

[Magox]

 

So true...

once again.

 

Which is why we have him by the balls. He will cave in as long as we don't first

[DazedandConfused]

Nate Clements wanted insane money form the Bills. He was a Pro Bowler. They watched him walk away. A very stupid organization paid him the insane money. Happens frequently.

 

 

It shouldn't matter to us how another team values a player. In fact, it's overwhelmingly clear that JP is overvalued so it would be in our best interest to exploit that and cash in. Maybe there is another morbidly obese TE out there who can be taught how to play 14 games or so a year at LT.

 

As for claiming the NFL is not a "true free market"------for practical purposes, it pretty much is. But there have to be contracts or there would be no league. Are you suggesting that at any time, any player should be able to "get" his free market value? How would that work? Everyone has a one year contract? No contract? Is every player always, at any time available to the next higher payer?

 

Without the ability of a team to sign a player to a long-term contract, over time, no team would pay anybody big dollars if they were just renting them for a year.

 

And stop with the "we won't win games without Peters" nonsense. First, he's just not that good, and, if in the real world Peters was the best LT in the league, nothing would have much changed last year anyway.

In the classic good old American way free market you would start with the NFL and NFLPA engaging in good old competition and negotiation rather than these two parties agreeing to restrain trade with approaches such as the draft and the restriction on humans of the age of conset (16 years old) and even adults (you cannot enter the NFL until the age group you would have entered college with has graduated except under extraordinary circumstances which are determined by the NFLPA/NFL conspiracy.

 

In the NFLPA threatened to decertify themselves after the owners kicked their butts in the mid-80s lockout. The owners ran rather than walked to sign a CBA which ratified this anti-free market conspiracy. They did this because if they had to participate in a true free market where individual owners negotiated personal services contracts with each individual player they would have made far less money than they did in the more socially oriented co-operative system embodied in the CBA.

 

The hallmarks of this agreement were:

 

1. The NFL and NFLPA agreed to restrain trade for the indiviudual as it produced a more stable product and thus higher profits than would have been produced or the team owners than if they engaged in free market competition with each other.

 

2. This initial CBA gave the players only a designated portion of the gross which owners quickly exploited (with huge government subsidies in cases like the Ralph) by lowering stadium size as base tickets sales were part of the gross designated to be shared with players to build premium seats which they did not have to share. This was a minor matter to the NFLPA as they commanded as much as over 70% of the designated gross and the stability of labor peace opened up the NFL to sign a deal with the networks for real money (all of which was part of the designated gross) so that the players made more money than they ever imagined even giving away a chunk of the gross to the owners.

 

3. The initial CBA demanded renegotiation prior to last season and Upshaw announced that the new deal would be for the entire gross and that the players needed to be guaranteed a share which started with a 6.

 

The final deal awarded the players 60.5% of the total gross and quite arguably made them not only partners but actually the majority partners of this deal. Folks like Ralph and the Cincy crew found it hard to give up even a credible argument that this was like the good free market run by the golden rule (he who has the gold rules).

 

However, Tagliabue and the smart lawyers who run this system with the college educated players (the smart one like Upshaw and Troy Vincent understand it and now join Goodell in squeezing the idiots like Pac-Man and Vick out of the NFL) were able to convince the vast majority of the owners that 40.5% of more money than they imagined (and they can imagine a lot) was better than 75 or even 100% of an NFL that followed the free market as the way the business was run.

 

Believe me, the modern NFL's connection o the free market is that it ain't a free market as it is based on the restriction of the rights of the individual to sign a contract with the highest bidder and to do so like in other professional sports from the age of 16 or so.

 

Do you see that difference?

[Dawgg]

Nate Clements wanted the best deal he could get on the open market. The fact that some other teams were willing to give him a big signing bonus and a back loaded contract that had an impressive total dollar amount wasn't under Clements direct control. The "insane" adjective is your own manifestation; he got the best deal he could and took advantage of the Bills stupidity to not protect their investment. Yes, the Bills front office, Marv Levy specifically, foolishly said, "Sure, OK, whatever you want to do, Nate." They let him hit free agency without protecting their own interests.

 

Marv: worst GM in Bills history.

[DazedandConfused]

Marv: worst GM in Bills history.

 

Marv was not great at all (the team he built in his interim role has not even made the playoffs much less compete seriously for the SB which was the goal).

 

However, there is a pretty good argument at least that:

 

Marv was better than TD who ultimately could not get past being run out of town by the guy he hired in Pittsburgh and his GMery of the Bills was very good on the business side (the move to St. Johns, moving a lot of the internal business into the 20th century s they went fully computerized from the days not to long ago when will call tickets were sorted in shoe boxes, and a extremly good knack for reading the market such as the deal he pulled off taking ATL to the cleaners over PP). Yet despite being a good businessman, TD hired the wrong guy in GW to be the HC cause he knew he could beat him and ended created a toxic relationship with Ralph and MM over this failed team.

 

Marv arguably was better than John Butler who had great talents as a scout manager, but probably cruised to the SB berths under his watch in great part due to great team building work of the previous GM and decisions he made like hiring the great facilitator Marv to be HC. Butler's GM reign was marked by bad mistakes as they continually stood the team on its head in search of a new Jim Kelly (a good GM would have reigned Ralph in from his dumb assessment that Jimbo had a few years left in his play and making the handshake deal which caused the Bills to actually violate the salary cap in paying off Jimbo off the books.

 

Add to that the GMs who oversaw the Bills in the time period between the AFL championships and the signing of Bruce Smith where the problem was the owner was not willing to spend the cash necessary to win.

 

Marv's job when he was hired was not simply to win but to right the ship of state which was listing badly after Butler ran out on Ralph and Ralph relexively tried to fire and then cost recover for firing him from Wade (he lost this crusade even though every one told him he would). Ralph hired TD out of desperation and then hired Marv out of double desperation when his decision to go with TD foundered badly.

 

Marv did a good job simply patching up the sinking ship. Besides that he oversaw 2 drafts which filled some primary needs we had with gutsy picks (for example Whitner proved to be the best safety in this draft when folks felt he reached- and he did reach for McCargo but found a credible player in round 5 to fill this slot. His next draft was also quite productive in getting players that filled gaps for this team.

 

Rather than the worse GM ever he is quite arguably the best of the past 3.

[AJ1]

I wonder ........... if we would have offered him a long term deal at around 8mil/year last year when he originally asked for a new contract, would he have snapped up the opportunity????

 

Don't you sense that the FO does not believe they will get full on field value back from Peters if they max out his contract without incentives?? I believe the FO doesn't trust Peters to deliver without significant incentives ( I wouldn't ). He has shown zero good faith in the last 18 months or so. There must always be something left on the table for this guy because I think that he has a severe character flaw regarding fulfilling contracts.

[Mickey]

Who has more leverage in the Peters fiasco? He is under contract for 2 more years right? He held out last season and performed with a less than stellar season. I don't feel he deserves his contract renegotiated until he performs on par with the upper echelon players at his position. The Bills should play hard ball with him.

He did that in 2007 so what you really mean is that you want to see him do it again. The team can decide if they want a happy Peters performing at his best with a full camp, like he did in 2007 or if they want another off season drama (or trade him and fill the hole on the roster with chewing gum). One way saves some cash but gets the team no closer to the playoffs. The other is going to cost big time. Not an easy choice for any team. And I think it is even harder for the Bills given what they are shelling out for Schobel and Kelsay. Peters could have allowed 40 sacks last year and still been more valuable to the team than those two. For Peters, he hasn't much to lose.

 

Apart from this authoritarian rich board, there isn't anyone in the league that doubts Peters is among the best in the league at LT. The Bills certainly think so. For them, this is just a numbers game, they want him but there is is a limit as to how bad they want him. Lord knows where their top number is or where Peters' bottom is but that is what negotiations are all about.

[stuckincincy]

Apart from this authoritarian rich board, there isn't anyone in the league that doubts Peters is among the best in the league at LT. The Bills certainly think so. For them, this is just a numbers game, they want him but there is is a limit as to how bad they want him. Lord knows where their top number is or where Peters' bottom is but that is what negotiations are all about.

 

 

A star on one of the leagues' more moribund, conservative offenses...as well as one that usually gets decent field position thanks to their ST's.

 

I wouldn't break the bank for him...

[Mickey]

Don't you sense that the FO does not believe they will get full on field value back from Peters if they max out his contract without incentives?? I believe the FO doesn't trust Peters to deliver without significant incentives ( I wouldn't ). He has shown zero good faith in the last 18 months or so. There must always be something left on the table for this guy because I think that he has a severe character flaw regarding fulfilling contracts.

Does Schobel have a severe character flaw because he refused to play out a contract only a year old that was a whopper to begin with and when he had been getting paid top dollar since he was drafted? The only difference here is that the team made a huge mistake with Schobel and with Kelsay and are trying to get the horse back in the barn with Peters.

 

Up until the first day of camp last year and the no-class press conference Brandon conducted, no one anywhere thought he had any "severe character flaws".

 

It is pretty simple. The team thinks he is a hell of a player but they have him over a barrel and want to keep him there if they can and Peters is doing what every player in that situation has done, pull out all the stops to try and get a new deal. Its not about trust, girl scout cookies or the warm and fuzzies. It is about $. I know, the primary role played by money in a professional sports league must come as a complete shock to you. The team will try and get the most player for the least money and the player will try and get every dime he can. Again, shocking, I know. Who could have seen this coming?

[Mickey]

A star on one of the leagues' more moribund, conservative offenses...as well as one that usually gets decent field position thanks to their ST's.

 

I wouldn't break the bank for him...

I think it is more challenging to play for a team that only throws when everyone in the stadium knows they are throwing. Having to block when the defense only needs to defend the first 5 yards off the line of scrimmage doesn't help either. Add in a total stiff at guard next to you, so stiff he was cut, kind of adds to the difficulty.

 

 

I think the surest way out of medicority is to let our best players leave. Because Lord knows, the stiffs we have had at DT are way better than Pat Williams so good thing we didn't break the bank for him. And certainly, losing Antoine Winfield and Nate Clements had nothing to do with our having to spend more and more draft picks on DB's every year to get their replacements while the other positions rotted on the vine. I think our strategy, to over pay for guys like Kelsay because hey, they carry a lunch pail and have a great motor and to break the bank for aging vets on the backsides of their careers like Schobel rather than signing young pro bowlers in their prime is working like a charm. We have the 7-9 seasons to prove it.