Asante really DOES deserve better...

[psychoPat]

....

If you are telling the Patriots to pay up, tell us what you think the Patriots should give him.

Yes ... please do !​

 

[patfanken]

While I totally disagree with the original poster, I do believer it is a lot more likely that Assante IS the real deal and will continue to develop into an elite CB. However if I was his agent, I would advise him to do the following.

If we can't get the money we think we are worth, Go to other teams and try and work out a trade that would be reasonable (like a first this year, 2nd next year, and a 3rd the year after) If that didn't work, I'd run down to Foxboro and sign my tender for $7.8MM

First that sets him up for life, GUARANTEED. If he goes out and shows that last year wasn't a fluke, he is an UFA at age 27, and can get a better deal. At Worst the Pats would franchise him again and would be forced to pay him $9.36MM and I would have him run down and sign THAT deal. That would mean that if he played well, he'd only be 28 when he became a UFA again, and if the Pats wanted to franchise him again, it would be for $11.2MM again GUARANTEED.

As I said in another thread, the only difference between a guy signing a LT contract with a lot of money guaranteed, and being franchised is, under the franchising tag, the player would actually have to EARN the money. AND WTF is wrong with that!!!!!!

 

[italia44]

While I totally disagree with the original poster, I do believer it is a lot more likely that Assante IS the real deal and will continue to develop into an elite CB. However if I was his agent, I would advise him to do the following.

If we can't get the money we think we are worth, Go to other teams and try and work out a trade that would be reasonable (like a first this year, 2nd next year, and a 3rd the year after) If that didn't work, I'd run down to Foxboro and sign my tender for $7.8MM

First that sets him up for life, GUARANTEED. If he goes out and shows that last year wasn't a fluke, he is an UFA at age 27, and can get a better deal. At Worst the Pats would franchise him again and would be forced to pay him $9.36MM and I would have him run down and sign THAT deal. That would mean that if he played well, he'd only be 28 when he became a UFA again, and if the Pats wanted to franchise him again, it would be for $11.2MM again GUARANTEED.

As I said in another thread, the only difference between a guy signing a LT contract with a lot of money guaranteed, and being franchised is, under the franchising tag, the player would actually have to EARN the money. AND WTF is wrong with that!!!!!!

You're completely missing the point.

This is about Bonus money......If a Franchised player,plays for the 7.8M tender and suffers a career-ending injury........sure he gets 7.8M or 11M
guaranteed.

However,with a 5 or 6 year contract,the player would receive 15-25M GUARANTEED,in up front Bonus money,even if he suffers a carrer-ending injury.

This is why the players don't like the Franchise Tag and want a contract with a mega-signing bonus.

It's all about the Benjamins......The UPFRONT Benjamins.

 

[Fogbuster]

While I totally disagree with the original poster, I do believer it is a lot more likely that Assante IS the real deal and will continue to develop into an elite CB. However if I was his agent, I would advise him to do the following.

If we can't get the money we think we are worth, Go to other teams and try and work out a trade that would be reasonable (like a first this year, 2nd next year, and a 3rd the year after) If that didn't work, I'd run down to Foxboro and sign my tender for $7.8MM

First that sets him up for life, GUARANTEED. If he goes out and shows that last year wasn't a fluke, he is an UFA at age 27, and can get a better deal. At Worst the Pats would franchise him again and would be forced to pay him $9.36MM and I would have him run down and sign THAT deal. That would mean that if he played well, he'd only be 28 when he became a UFA again, and if the Pats wanted to franchise him again, it would be for $11.2MM again GUARANTEED.

As I said in another thread, the only difference between a guy signing a LT contract with a lot of money guaranteed, and being franchised is, under the franchising tag, the player would actually have to EARN the money. AND WTF is wrong with that!!!!!!

If only agents would think that way.

It is obvious that Asante is thinking he's now in his best position -- maybe forever in his career -- to score the big one: 24 passes defended (according to an earlier poster) and 10 INTs is OUTSTANDING stat material to shop teams with. Plus, his film probably shows him looking good. In the games I saw he was not out of position or burned much last year.

So, his agent has probably told him: "This is the best chance you may ever have to score big. Pull out all the stops."


//

 

[brdmaverick]

I agree with the original poster of the thread......

It is unfortunate to see the Pats open up their wallets for guys who have done absolutely nothing for this team (at least not yet), while..........

a.)one of their own guys is more deserving of receiving a big payday

b.)and the Pats franchising him is keeping him from getting a big payday from some other team


This situation just isn't right.

This might even be a locker room distraction for some of the other guys as well. Guys like Vrabel and Warren have to at list be a little bit bitter that new guys on the team are making more money than guys that have already helped bring three championships to the organization.


Before it was okay for the Pats to play hardball with their own free agents because they played hardball with everyone. Now they are heading down a dangerous path of setting the trend of only playing hardball with your own guys.

 

[Ring 6]

I agree with the original poster of the thread......

It is unfortunate to see the Pats open up their wallets for guys who have done absolutely nothing for this team (at least not yet), while..........

a.)one of their own guys is more deserving of receiving a big payday

b.)and the Pats franchising him is keeping him from getting a big payday from some other team


This situation just isn't right.

This might even be a locker room distraction for some of the other guys as well. Guys like Vrabel and Warren have to at list be a little bit bitter that new guys on the team are making more money than guys that have already helped bring three championships to the organization.


Before it was okay for the Pats to play hardball with their own free agents because they played hardball with everyone. Now they are heading down a dangerous path of setting the trend of only playing hardball with your own guys.

I do not agree with the basic concept.
Deciding what to pay for a player in the future should have nothing to do with being obligated to what they did for you in the past. Thats bad business.

Of course what they did in the past can be a great indication of their future value. However, this argument says with 2 equally talented players, one an aging Patriots, the other a younger FA from another team that you should pay more for the aging guy who was here before. That is bad business because everything says the younger guy from the other team will have more value during the contract.

Teams that have imploded under the cap have done so because they paid aging players based on what they were in their prime, which is already over. Smart management is to pay guys based on what they will be worth when they are cashing those checks.

 

[WhiZa]

Wait a minute...this was his best year...BY FAR his best...but who is really deserving here... Briggs, Grant, Freeny.. THEY ALL have had 4+ solid years and they do deserve the big bucks...Asante?? Sorry he has had one and his others have been OK but not top dollar like these 3 other franchised players. Top cover??
I agree he is good..but it remains to be seen if he is in the "top cover" category. Excuse me?? 7 million is neglecting to pay a productive player?? Sorry...you sound like some troll from another board. I really wonder how much Asante would have gotten on the open market..more than 7 mill?? How much is he demanding?? Bailey, Bly, Clements money?? Sorry if he is asking for that..it is way way too much..

I'm with you 100%. Two years ago we all thought he was nothing more than a nickel corner.

 

[zarakotas5]

Samuel's first three years, expressed as "passes defensed," may tell us more than the Sportscenter hilite reel having to do with interceptions. INTs can be game-changing events, but they can also happen for reasons not related to coverage skills. Also, 10 INTs in a season is considered good... so that means you actually "make a play" between once a game and once every two games? No way.

It's really hard to get stats like "did they throw at your side of the field," etc., but even if it wasn't, it wouldn't be reliable, because you have to adjust for who's across from you. You could be great, but play next to Deion Sanders, and voila, everybody throws to your side of the field... that's why I like PDs as an indicator (that's the number of times you break up the play before the receiver gets the ball.) Anyway...

PD

04 12
05 16
06 24

Or, you can look at INTs...

04 1
05 3
06 10

Because of the low frequency of INTs, it looks flukier. But I would say the PD stats look like a developing star, not a fluke.

He's also making a ton of tackles, just like Law use to, 60 last year. Everybody always says a CB making a lot of tackles is a bad thing, because that means someone caught a ball. Well, yeah, pretty much. But when you're not playing press coverage every down, it's expected you will sometimes give up short routes to not get burned on the long ones. Anybody can make the tackle on any play, beyond that... of course, the majority will be a guy tackling his man, after that man caught the ball. So anyway, his tackles have increased from 44 to 60 in the same year in which his INTs increased from 3 to 10. You might just conclude he's trying to make plays sometimes, missing, but keeping his head enough to make the tackle. Maybe that's reading too much in.

Anyway, the point is, he's trending upward in every way you can statistically measure.

Scott Pioli and BB have these statistics, of course. They have miles of game tape. They have intangible memories of being there, and BB has knowledge of skills, points he's worked on, hundreds of practices, etc.

And they came up with a value for him.

Asante has his memories of some moments of glory, some headlines, all those points he worked on, all those hours of practices, and surprise, surprise, with his agent, he's come up with a value for himself.

Then there are items such as deal structure noted above.

It's a matter of whether Pats' Value + intangible wiggling = Asante's self-assessment.

But if it's pure market value? The Pats are 1 of 32 teams. Odds are 32 to 1 against them placing the highest value on Asante. Luckily, it's going to take more than a hair's difference to move most guys... so we would only have to be in the top tier of teams, you would think, in terms of our belief in a given player. Still call it 8 to 1 against.

In other words, take the best deal the market could conceivably give you, and most times that means you leave your original team. "Home Town Discount" is the delta between what your own team pays, and the high offer on the market. If the delta is not significant (say, less than $500K per year,) you may consider sticking for the ring, Asante.

Just one fan's opinion.

PFnV

It usually confounds me why people quote long post to simply add some unnecessary comment, but:

What he said. The End.

PS: In fact, if I was PF.com savvy enough, I would re-post this a thread, with a poll of options, so that this matter could be done with, as far as wild speculation goes.

 

[italia44]

yea,,,but don't forget,he played mostly at RCB before

he switched to LCB,which is the preference for a right
handed person.Last year at LCB,is when he really took off.All the best CB's want to play LCB(Ty Law and Champ Bailey.)

 

[danny88]

I agree with the original poster of the thread......

It is unfortunate to see the Pats open up their wallets for guys who have done absolutely nothing for this team (at least not yet), while..........

a.)one of their own guys is more deserving of receiving a big payday

b.)and the Pats franchising him is keeping him from getting a big payday from some other team


This situation just isn't right.

This might even be a locker room distraction for some of the other guys as well. Guys like Vrabel and Warren have to at list be a little bit bitter that new guys on the team are making more money than guys that have already helped bring three championships to the organization.


Before it was okay for the Pats to play hardball with their own free agents because they played hardball with everyone. Now they are heading down a dangerous path of setting the trend of only playing hardball with your own guys.

Until you know how much the pats are offering this post holds no weight. The pats could have offered him a fair deal. If he wants to be overpayed and get money he is not worth, they should tell him to screw. They play "hardball" with guys demanding things that are over the top. If Samuel thinks he should get clements type money, see yea!

This is the same guy who was a "jacked up" regular on espn until last year. he should be fair about this. One good season does not make him Champ Bailey.

I hope we get the draft picks.

 

[patpatriot]

Who among us does not want to be recognized for the quality of our work (if indeed it is truly excellect)? In the football world recognition = $. Clement and Bly have signed deals that express this recognition because they are players who have been voted by their peers to multiple Pro Bowls. AS wants similar or the same reconition even though the body of his work does not reflect the same ability as the others. *That* is the problem.

If I were the pats, I would offer AS a contract averaging 6M a year with a signing bonus of 14 mill. As other people have pointed out, that would be a very fair deal even possibly overpaying him. I would then structure the deal so that it *looked* like it was better than Bly's but less than Clements. AS gets plenty o' dough and the "respect" he needs. The Pats get a very good player whose salary they can live with.

If that is not enough for AS he can do a "Walter Jones" (play every year under the Franchise tag) or he can sit out and see his value slowly disappear.

AS has very little leverage in this situation.

And another thing. While working conditions are a very important part of any contract offer*, they do not present any pronounced *public* value. AS lives in a world where his peers chant "It's all about the Benjamins". It takes a very mature individual to see though the fog of this nonsense (think here about our new free agent linebacker...he expressed it very well) and make the kind of informed choice that maximizes the possibility of employment happiness.

* If AS has 2-3 Rings already...how much do you think it matters to him that he might get a 3rd, 4th, or 5th?

 

[Gopats!!!]

I think comparing AS to Thomas, Bruschi and those guys is a little unfair. Those guys are exceptional people of very high character that realize they can "get paid" while not trying to bleed every last cent out of a team. I'm not saying AS has a low character or anything just because he can't compare to those guys.

In addition, who knows what really is going on behind the scenes.

Hopefully things do work out for the team and him. We give him his millions and he takes a reasonable price.

If he does try holding out, I would think that he would be worth a lot more in trade than db. db was never a top ten WR, AS was tied for the league high in interceptions.

Having said that, he has had only one dominant year. I think BB knows if that was because of $$ or he is just hitting his stride. He doesn't deserve to be the highest paid CB (IMO).

 

[mgteich]

Nope, AS has no leverage. If this is true, I suggest that this discussion continue in mid-July or perhaps August. Certainly, you do not expect to see Samuel before then. And yes, Asante will show up for practice at the last possible minute. After all, since this is all about business, he needs to show up in time for his first $500K paycheck. Yes, he will take out insurance. He will play as required by the league's rules likely with little or not enthusiasm. Certainly, he will never play hurt.

This "attitude" will certainly affect his value for some teams. Others understand, and couldn't care less if a player dislikes a team that uses the franchise tag to the letter of the CBA. There is about zero reason to be believe that AS will be a star for the patriots. More likely is that he will be injured after a game or two, and collect the $8M on the bench or on IR.

Keep your dreams of forcing AS to be a start performer. They are indeed dreams.

I am certainly not saying that AS and the patriots can't sign a deal, even a one year deal for him to play, with no tag next year. But, don't believe for a second that he has no leverage.

 

[VJCPatriot]

Asante wants "respect" and that means money. What did Bly get 5/33 and 16M bonus?

I would offer Asante 7/45 with 16M bonus.
Backload the hell out of it, spread the cap hit of the bonus over 7 years. Asante gets his "respect", the Pats keep their #1 corner at a manageable cap number, and Patriots nation can rest easy for the next 4 years or so, at the end of which the Patriots will ask Asante to either restructure or they cut him.

Let's talk about salary structure then.
Base Bonus
Year 1 1M 6M (Signing Bonus)
Year 2 1M 5M (Roster Bonus)
Year 3 1M 5M (Roster Bonus)
Year 4 5M
Year 5 6M
Year 6 7M
Year 7 8M

Does anyone think this could work?
Samuel comes out looking good because he's averaging over 6M per year and it's a long term deal with a big bonus.

This deal can also easily grow to "look" like a 50M+ dollar deal by adding funny money to years 5, 6, and 7 of the contract.
For example if we change the contract like so:

Year 5 7M (+1M)
Year 6 9M (+2M)
Year 7 10M (+2M)

7/50 contract comes out to 7.1M per year which sounds very competitive. But if the extra 5M comes on the back end... you get where I'm going with this?

 

[arrellbee]

I think everyone is missing absolutely huge points.

Many seem to be going under the assumption that it is 'fair' for Samuel to get a long term deal at this time. He is not legally or morally entitled to that. He belongs to a players 'association' [union] which has legally and honorably signed an agreement [CBA] with the NFL that says that a team has the right to franchise a player and the player, under the legal and moral and responsible obligation of his associations agreement with the NFL, is obligated to honor that agreement and play under a franchise tag. What is so hard to understand about that? Do the folks advocating this want to throw out United States business and contract law ? I don't get it. Samuel wants to throw out his legal obligations for his own benefit. That is chaos and anarchy. By the way, he actually has another right - he can refuse his services and not play.

The other thing that many seem to competely ready to disregard (and substitute shoot-from-the-hip ignorant judgment) is the known fact that Pioli/Belichick et al operate under a general philosophy that there is a relatively optimum distribution of salary cap numbers across 53 player positions plus injured reserve plus replacement players for those on IR plus practice squad. Maybe you think, without any consideration of how to optimally spread the salary cap across all of those obligations, that you can make a singular judgment that Samuel is worth more of a piece of that pie than Belichick and Pioli do - I think you are sadly mistaken. And if you think your evaluation of how much Samuel is capable of now and in the future versus other possible players is better than Belichick and Pioli - again, I think you are very misguided and sadly mistaken.

JMHO.

Cheers.

 

[PatsWorldChamps]

As a huge fan of the Patriots, I am in a tricky situation on this. I want to sit here and pretend that Asante is asking for too much, but lets face the facts. The guy is a consistently productive cornerback coming off his best year yet and is a legitimately top cover corner in the league. I'm not putting him in that "shutdown corner" slot just yet cause he does have a lot to prove still. I think its an insult that the Pats will go out and spend (for once) on guys who haven't proved anything in our system (welker,washington,thomas..etc) but neglect to pay a productive player. With all this being said some players have gotten greedy with the patriots before (Law,Branch, Milloy..etc) and all of them in my opinion, deserved to be cut or traded. Pay up patriots! Because Asante is going to be cosistently productive for a long long time...

what should a heart surgeon hold out for? i think the average heart surgeon is way underpaid at $500K/yr... hospitals should franchise tag them... who is worth more, a top 5 heart surgeon, or a top 5 CB? get a grip on reality people... miguel does a great job on the cap analysis... how much do you think patriots players donate to his charity, bread of life?

 

[PatsWorldChamps]

Nope, AS has no leverage. If this is true, I suggest that this discussion continue in mid-July or perhaps August. Certainly, you do not expect to see Samuel before then. And yes, Asante will show up for practice at the last possible minute. After all, since this is all about business, he needs to show up in time for his first $500K paycheck. Yes, he will take out insurance. He will play as required by the league's rules likely with little or not enthusiasm. Certainly, he will never play hurt.

This "attitude" will certainly affect his value for some teams. Others understand, and couldn't care less if a player dislikes a team that uses the franchise tag to the letter of the CBA. There is about zero reason to be believe that AS will be a star for the patriots. More likely is that he will be injured after a game or two, and collect the $8M on the bench or on IR.

Keep your dreams of forcing AS to be a start performer. They are indeed dreams.

I am certainly not saying that AS and the patriots can't sign a deal, even a one year deal for him to play, with no tag next year. But, don't believe for a second that he has no leverage.

yeah, poor asante is being, in your words, FORCED to play football...mg, i like your roster predictions, and some things you post... you are way off base here... asante is not being forced to play in the nfl under the contract that HIS union agreed to... he is free to work at any other job in the united states... if you think he is being forced to work, for only $8M, what else do you think he should do for work? do you think he could do your job? im sure he'd do it for millions less per year than his franchise tag.

 

[rabthepat]

To Date, Asante is a 1 hit wonder. Last year was a good year. Let's not forget the times Marvin Harrison has made him look stupid. He is not Ty Law. Like Deion Branch, don't let the door hit you in the butt if you don't want to be in New England.

 

[patpatriot]

Those "other teams" are very foolish IMO then. I expect football players to play football because they love the game. If a player only plays for money, I suspect that no winning team would be willing to risk mega bucks to sign him.

 

[MrBigglesWorth]

As a huge fan of the Patriots, I am in a tricky situation on this. I want to sit here and pretend that Asante is asking for too much, but lets face the facts. The guy is a consistently productive cornerback coming off his best year yet and is a legitimately top cover corner in the league. I'm not putting him in that "shutdown corner" slot just yet cause he does have a lot to prove still. I think its an insult that the Pats will go out and spend (for once) on guys who haven't proved anything in our system (welker,washington,thomas..etc) but neglect to pay a productive player. With all this being said some players have gotten greedy with the patriots before (Law,Branch, Milloy..etc) and all of them in my opinion, deserved to be cut or traded. Pay up patriots! Because Asante is going to be cosistently productive for a long long time...

Personally I think he's overvaluing himself in regard to the Pats. I think one year at just over 7 million is a nice deal as guaranteed money. I'm sure part of the debate is over guaranteed money and when he is suppose to get it. I'm sure they offered option bonuses that give the Pats leverage if he doesn't produce and he doesn't like that.

With that said the volcano of distraction is starting to bubble. I'd get rid of the distraction before it erupts.