Originally Posted by dmvincent
I see the word "elite" thrown around a lot when discussing Flacco, is he or isn't he? I'm curious as to what makes Flacco elite and if he is, why is it ridiculous that he got paid this money?
wow, just wow
you can't tell me this makes any sense, sure he should get paid but you've got QBs like Rodgers and Brees making half that money...I mean he's even making more than Brady, that's just absurd. Sorry MD, you can try to spin this anyway you want but the Ravens wayyyyyyyyy overpaid
And that is all I was trying to say. I'm not saying that Flacco isn't good, or Flacco didn't help the Ravens win the Super Bowl, or that the Ravens had to lock up Flacco.. I'm just saying that they grossly over-paid for this guy.. But then again, who isn't grossly over-paid in pro sports these days??
I just know that in a few years, the Ravens will be trying to trade Flacco and this contract. Its way too much for one player..
Zorro says "vote for Dobber"
Angus is my best friend at dobberhockey..
Ummm so now you are just making shit up. Brees makes nearly as much annually after he signed his own huge contract last year just for one year shorter. Is it absurd that a year after Brees signed a $100 million deal for five years at age 33 that Flacco would sign a $120 million deal for six years at age 28 oh and he just happens to be doing so after winning Super Bowl MVP? Absolutely not. This is the way the market works. Shit keeps escalating.
And as for Rodgers. The reason he isn't making that amount is because the Packers gambled that they new what they had in him and gave him a sweet offer after just his first season as a starter. That was back in 2008 and they gave him a six year $65 million deal, which looks awesome now but he was relatively unproven coming off a mediocre first season as a starter. When his deal is up after next year do you really think he's not going to get similarly paid? Hell he's probably going to make more. And he should. This is the free market.
And just so we are clear. All the smart teams know that there are certain positions that you spend whatever it takes to lock down because you are helpless without top notch talent there. Quarterback is that position and the Ravens will gladly ante up for the security of knowing they have a good quarterback for the next six years. That's six more years they can keep making runs at the playoffs.
Every year the Ravens (and other good teams like the Patriots) spend big at the necessary positions and then use their excellent scouting and player development to fill the rest of the holes on the cheap. And they will continue to do so with Flacco at the helm.
Just try to imagine the Ravens without Flacco in there. Who are they going to start? Tyrod Taylor? They had no leverage. They couldn't even use the franchise tag because the cheap one would have allowed teams to make bids (and trust that some desperate team would have bid as much if not more because no one realizes how terrible it is to not have a quarterback until they don't have one) and the big franchise tag would have ruined their cap space for free agency.
Simply put the Ravens have a better chance of winning with Joe Flacco than they do without him and that's by miles. In the salary cap era especially the days where you could build a juggernaut all over the field and not have top notch quarterbacking play are gone. Flacco is getting compensated this way because that's what the free market demands.
I wish Flacco would have taken a home town discount.
But the following statements are all true:
Flacco is playing a sport where the average career is 3.5 years.
NFL contracts aren't fully guaranteed.
There is an extensive history of NFL players experiencing severe chronic injuries long after retirement.
So why would Flacco take a home town discount?
I'd also posit that if we were living in some world where everything got reset and every NFL player was a free agent that Flacco wouldn't get the biggest contract but I guarantee he'd be in the top 15. He just took advantage of his impeccable timing. It's that simple.
And yeah, I will admit that there is some hubris on my part with my expectation that the Ravens will just continue to fill in the gaps on the cheap while continuing to draft and develop good talent but why should I expect any different? This management team has been together for years and they have proven time and time again that they know what they are doing.
This contract isn't going to be a steal in a few years but it's going to look way more reasonable as other top QBs sign their next deals. And with how lucrative the NFL is the cap is just going to keep rising so it's going to get easier and easier for the Ravens to deal with this situation.
It's so easy to say he's overpaid but please explain to me what leverage the Ravens could possibly have used to get him to sign for cheaper.
The Ravens had zero leverage, I agree with you there.. But they could have used the contracts of Brady, Brees, and both Mannings as prime examples of where he should be..
I'm not arguing here, I just feel the Ravens didn't really do a good thing here.. They are paying Flacco too much money. How can a guy like Flacco make more then Brady??
Zorro says "vote for Dobber"
Angus is my best friend at dobberhockey..
Honestly I think your best argument is that NFL contracts are not really worth the paper they are printed on (at least not to me, I think telling someone you will pay them 10-20 mil a yr for 6 yrs means you pay them 10-20 mil for 6 years, you dont' say 'oops we changed our minds' after a year or two, that's not a contract IMO,that's ****ing bullshit. But yes, that is the way it works and that is a major concern with the NFL, but c'mon dude, 120 mil? I did forget about Brees contract fair enough, but my core point stands, do you put Flacco on par with Brees for talent? Hell no! Niot even close IMO... I don't, he's a solid middle of the pack QB who can push deep with ease (and that makes him a little more valuable), but he's nowhere close to the talent of Brees, Brady, Rodgers, even Eli Manning and Big Ben even at this point. If he proves otherwise then I'll reconsider but I still think that's far too much money to throw at a guy who had a ton of help
I think you are underestimating him here but more importantly you aren't fully considering the situational factors.
Flacco is younger than all of those guys. He's also insanely durable. If you are going to invest this much money you are probably going to give it to the young guy who hasn't missed a start in his entire career. Now quarterbacks tend to age well so the age factor isn't huge but it is still of value especially if you are considering Flacco's place on this scale. The more experience he gains will only help him continue to bridge the gap between the above that he isn't already at par with.
Brees is supposedly a big injury risk, which is part of the reason the Saints played hardball with him in free agency and is the reason the Dolphins didn't sign him back in the day. Now we don't know what the doctor reports are so I can't pretend to say if the injury risk is real (only the Saints really know) but there are other things we can draw from the Brees situation. We know from that experience that playing hardball with a quarterback doesn't work.
Rodgers I already discussed earlier why he has been a bargain for the Packers and also that he's gonna get an even bigger deal than Flacco in like a year.
Brady just renegotiated his deal but was scheduled to make nearly $15 million over the next two seasons and that's on a deal he signed several years ago. He's now making less than that - especially in the three years they tacked on but he's in a position in his career where he can give his team a home town discount and he's also at a point where the Patriots should reasonably be looking to find his successor. Brady is 35 and has already made his money and is worth way more than Flacco because of his endorsements and the fact he's married to a freaking model. He doesn't need to accomplish anything. Flacco just finished his rookie deal that saw him make less than $ 7 million last year. He wasn't going to be taking any discount.
As for Big Ben and Eli well I just flat out disagree that those guys are actually better. Ben has been deteriorating from years of being one of the most hit quarterbacks in the league. Now he has actually just restructured his deal but he gets more in guaranteed money and it reduces his cap hold from a very similar number as what Flacco's will be.
And Eli is essentially Joe Flacco just a few years advanced. He signed a six year nearly $100 million deal back in 2009, just a year after winning his first Super Bowl as the same sort of "I received lots of help and am a mad gunman of a quarterback" way that Flacco just did. Well even after signing that deal Eli and the Giants were still able to win another Super Bowl. General inflation doesn't account for the approximately $25 million difference between the two contracts but NFL salary inflation over the past four years does.
And I'll point out that with regard to some of these guys restructuring their deals. There's nothing to say that once Flacco's deal is near it's end that he doesn't also restructure his deal to help his team out so you can't really use the fact that other guys are restructuring their deals against what Flacco just got. They all commanded the big bucks when they got their opportunity to get them.
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