What's the Deal?

Well, Samuel signed his franchise tender. Or, as one reader links below, Asante signed a one-year contract - at this point the terms seem to be used interchangeably in the media, and I, gentle reader, will have to ask my cap/contract mavens whether the tender is in any sense modifiable. This is a very important point. Since Asante's is at $7.79 Million for one year (the average of the top five cornerback contracts in the league,) his "$7.79 Million Contract" sure looks like the plain old franchise tender.

But wait, there's more! In Samuel's case, the franchise tender came with "assurances" that he would not be franchised again next year, if certain conditions are met (such as a number of team wins, or an amount of playing time.) All this according to Adam Schechter, of NFL Network.

Say wha'? I always thought that the tender was basically a cookie-cutter one-year deal. You want to play in the NFL, you play at this amount for this team. Life sucks, you've been franchised. Badda bing, badda boom.

All of which leads me to believe that what Samuel has signed (and looks so happy about having signed,) is actually a one-year contract -- assuming of course that the two are in fact different things (with a one-year franchise tender being essentially a species of contract.)

The deadline for multiyear deals was some time ago, so now the team had the option of signing a single year deal at or above the tag amount ($7.79 M), or letting Samuel go, presumeably for compensation in trade. So I suppose the team did the former, and signed a one-year deal.

Or, it is also possible that Samuel's side is just happy to see it all wind down, and to get down to football, and Schechter et al. think they have the real scoop. If so, we get a replay of all this a year from now. But you'd think Schechter's credibility is more important to him than claiming a scoop, especially if the "scoop" is a wholesale fabrication.

Eh well. We'll see.

What's important is Asante is back, Moss, Stallworth, Welker, and Adalius "96 Tears" Thomas are in town, this team looks scary this year, and Mr. Lombardi's namesake has been too long a-wanderin'.

Two weeks, ladies and gentlemen!