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CLICK HERE to Register for a free account and login for a smoother ad-free experience. It's easy, and only takes a few moments.By being paid for 10 weeks, has White now accrued an official NFL season?
Also, if he is signed by another team before Week 10, does the difference revert to the Pats' cap savings?
Do I have incorrect information regarding that five-day window to reach an injury settlement? Or is this a case where the injury settlement happened earlier, but the public did not know about until two weeks later?
I think that many of us are confused by the situation with the IR.
Which players have signed settlements and are eligible to return this year? If the players are not on someone else's 53, when are each of these players available to us?
Which players are on season-ending IR and will be available to us next year? I expect that we would sign a injury settlement with any player whose contract was up this year.
It could be that if a team reaches an injury settlement with a player within 5 days of waiving the injured player they are then allowed to resign that player later that season. But if they do not they can not sign the player to a contract later that season.
In theory injury settlements are based on the amount of time that the club and player agree that the player would be unable to play due to the injury. So if the the thought is that he would miss four weeks then he gets 4/17 of his salary, if the two sides agree the injury would cause him to miss eight weeks then he should get 8/17 of his salary, etc.
The open question is whether the potential return date to the original team is tied to the amount of weeks implicit in the agreement. I presume that other teams are free to sign the player in the interim.
I too am interested in Cunningham, and in Justin Francis.
The open question is whether the potential return date to the original team is tied to the amount of weeks implicit in the agreement. I presume that other teams are free to sign the player in the interim.
I too am interested in Cunningham, and in Justin Francis.
I was wrong and you are correct; the length of time before a player may return to the original club is indeed tied to the amount of time negotiated with the injury settlement.
According to Jason at OverTheCap.com the length of time a player is eligible to return to the original club is not six weeks from the time of the waived/injured settlement that I thought it was, but is six weeks on top of the length of the injury settlement.
What Exactly are Injury Settlements? - Over the Cap
When a minor injury occurs a determination is made for weeks that the player will miss due to injury. The options would be to hold the player until he is healthy enough to be released or to have the two sides agree right away as to the amount of weeks that the injury should keep the player sidelined.
Once the weeks are agreed upon the team simply agrees to pay the player as if he was on the roster for those weeks. Teams and players have a 5 day window to agree to this settlement. Once the settlement occurs the player is again released from the team (in most cases exposed to waivers), except in this situation the player can return to the team, with a bit of a catch. The player is not allowed to return to the team until the length of the settlement passes plus another 6 weeks.
Let’s see how this works in practice. An undrafted rookie player gets injured at the end of training camp and is waived with an injury designation, so that a team that claims him knows that they are claiming an injured player. If he goes unclaimed, which is likely, he reverts back to the teams Injured list. From that point the team and player have five days to negotiate the settlement.
Because this is a rookie he will have a split salary of $288,000. That is the baseline price that the two sides work with. They agree that the injury will sideline the player for two regular season weeks. The two sides now agree to an injury settlement of $33,822 and change. That is the same salary as if they carried him on IR for two weeks. The player is again waived with the knowledge that he agreed to a settlement for an existing injury.
The player is then free to sign with any team in the NFL at that point and agrees to waive all rights to compensation from the team in the event the injury turns out to be more serious than expected. The player will be eligible to re-sign with the team in Week 9, which is the two week settlement period plus six week waiting period.