Free Agency For Beginners
The NFL’s new year doesn’t start the day after the Super Bowl, it starts on the 16th March 2022, at exactly 4pm New York time. Prior to this time, no player who is contracted to another team can sign for a new team until the new league year starts. Players who are still under contract with their current team can resign with their team if they so choose. However, there is a ‘legal tampering’ window that starts 48 hours prior to the new league year, so that players’ agents can talk to prospective teams. This is a very important factor, as it gives players the chance to ‘test the market’.
A team who has a player they would like to resign might decide to hold off signing him until the legal tampering window opens, this carries great risk/reward. An example of this can be seen with the Green Bay Packers and one of their wide receivers, Marquez Valdes Scantling, or MVS. MVS is a great deep ball, big play wide receiver, he also has good range in outside routes, and has had the benefit or playing with Aaron Rodgers. He’s about to become a free agent, and while Green Bay would like to have him back on the team, they also have to figure out how much they can afford to pay, while he is willing to wait and see what the open market is willing to pay. This can be risky for both player and team, if other teams in the league are willing to fork out a big contract for him, then he’s able to go to the Green Bay Packers and ask them if they are willing to match that offer. On the flip side, if the market comes to him and is offering less then he loses leverage and might have to take a deal that is less than what he could have got had he re-signed earlier.
In this case, I would be willing to bet that MVS is going to get a much higher offer than what the Packers can afford to spend. Green Bay already have the leagues top receiver, Davante Adams to resign, not to mention a lot of defensive players they picked up on one year deals this season that they need to resign. I wouldn’t be shocked if MVS was offered a deal totalling around $80-100M over 5 years, that will likely turn into a 3 year $60M guaranteed contract. More on complete contract values later.
False Dawn
While this time of year can be especially exciting for teams, it also comes with a warning sign. The biggest spenders in free agency are rarely the team that makes it to the Super Bowl the following year. And the reasons are simple, if you need to spend a huge amount of money on a player then you’ve not done a great job drafting players or developing them, and/or, you’re not a good enough team to keep the player when his contract is coming to an end (see Allen Robinson, WR, Chicago Bears).
One other worry for teams is the Albert Haynesworth effect. Haynesworth was a former defensive tackle for the Tennessee Titan who, at the start of the 2007 season, knew his contract had two seasons left to run, he was 26 years old, and had one big contract left to go and get. He spent the next two seasons making his stats look good. He would have more sacks, forced fumble and passes defended in the last two seasons than he did in the previous 5. He went all out to make himself as desirable as possible, and it worked. However his own team, the Titans offered him a small, moderate contract - $34M over 4 years, they knew he was a stats sellout, basically forgoing the team instructions to just make sure he had the stats that put up the price tag on teams that didn’t study tape all that well. Lucky for Haynesworth, he had two suckers lined up. The Tampa Bay Bucs and the Washington Commanders (Redskins at the time). Both teams were not in great shape, and the Washington Commanders had, and still have, one of the worse team owners in the league… they bought in. They offered him a 7 year $100M contract with $41M guaranteed and $32M in the first 13 months. Even Stevie Wonder could see what’s coming next! Haynesworth turned up to training camp over weight, and couldn’t pass the basic physical test. He eventually got in shape, and played some football, but for all the hype around the signing, Haynesworth was cut from the team after two seasons and was out of the league after 3.
If you really want to pay money for a big name, make sure the tape lines up with the hype.
Value the real numbers
NFL contracts are extremely complicated, due in part because of the salary cap. While the cap is a great asset to teams in the league, it’s also like the tax man that you can’t hide from. Right now, the NFL cap for 2022 is set to be $208.2 million. That’s $208.2 million for all 53 players… there are other things to keep in mind:
If you sign a player to a multi-year deal, and they have a guarantee for those years, then even if you cut him early, you still have to pay that amount in that cap year. An example of this: Latavius Murray was signed in 2019 by the New Orleans Saints to a 4 year deal, that deal included guaranteed money for each year. He was cut by the Saints after the 2020 season, but as he was guaranteed money for 2021 and 2022, they will still have to pay him $1,050,000 for 2021 and $850,000 for 2022 (he also signed and played for the Ravens in 2021 under a new contract). The money the Saints are paying Murray is called ‘dead money’ as it’s counted to your cap number, but you get nothing from it.
The cap is not defined for future years. So contracts that you draw up now must take into account that the cap may not increase next year. For example, in 2021 the NFL cap reduced due to COVID. There are many factors that go into the value of the cap, and one of those factors is the gate revenue each team brings in. Obviously in 2020 there was little to no ticket sales, so teams had reduced earnings and this affected the cap. While the cap almost always goes up, how much it goes up is not known, so you will see contacts that increase in value as years go by, hoping that the cap expands enough to allow the team to cope.
Guaranteed money is more important than anything. If you see a contract that looks inflated for the player in question, then the guaranteed money is likely to be lower than normal. An example of this is Xavian Howard. Howard is a corner back for the Miami Dolphins, a very good player, however also difficult to keep happy. He was drafted by the Dolphins and then resigned in 2019. His contract was for 5 years at $75.25 million. However, only $27 million was fully guaranteed but it got up to $46 million if he hit other guarantees (for example if he was still on the team on the 5th of March 2021 then his entire contract for that year was guaranteed). The rest of the money in his contract was a mix of non-guaranteed base salary and bonuses. The bonus money is also split into two parts, Likely to be Earned (LE) and Unlikely to be Earned (UE). An example of LE would be playing >60% of snaps in the season, or matching your previous average amount of tackles over 3 years. An example of UE is Super Bowl MVP, or defensive player of the year, factors that are more outside of your own control.
There are other factors that go into the salary cap, but for now, I think the complexity is evident. If you have any questions about the cap, leave a comment at the bottom of the article.
The Draft
The NFL draft has an interesting effect on free agency. Most teams have very large scouting departments that spend all year watching college football. By the time the college season is over in December, teams have started to grade and rank just about all college players who are eligible for the draft. With that said, if they look at the upcoming draft and have no quarterback in the draft graded higher than 5 (out of 7), then you can bet that most teams have similar grades on those quarterbacks. This has a knock on effect towards the quarterbacks who are in free agency, they’re value is going up! This is evident in this years draft class. While I’ve not done a lot of study on the upcoming quarterbacks for the 2022 draft, the scouts who put their word out have made it known that this class of QB is not great. While there are some teams willing to take a shot at one of them in the first round, there is no #1 pick QB. It will mark the first time since Myles Garret in 2017 (even though Patrick Mahomes was available).
When you have a weak position group in the upcoming draft, you’ll see that position group getting a lot of money in Free Agency. The NFL is very transparent when it comes to contracts, the players who get the most guaranteed money are those ones who played the market to the best of their ability. They might not be the best players but they did maximise their value, knowing when teams will over pay and when they will under pay is why having a good agent is important.
I’ll leave you with an image of the money paid to Kirk Cousins over his career (via overthecap.com). He has a record of 59 wins, 59 loses and two ties. He has 223 TDs and 128 turnovers, slightly above average QB play that has resulted in $231.5 million in earnings.