Well you can certainly write, but I am not sure what your point was though.
I am unwaveringly on both sides of the issue.
Pretty much the same point you made, basically, with the addendum that the Pats aren't going to get any
easier to deal with. What some holdouts don't seem to get is that the more of them there are, the more a pattern emerges. If the Pats want to dissuade this behavior (the holdouts,) there are other tools they have not used. For example, they let Deion seek a trade - well, he was "holdout #2," in an apparently unrelated situation to Sey's... so the establishment of the pattern was not as crystal clear as now.
Now we have a situation where you can start looking at each holdout as part of the pattern.
Yes, I agree, the team generates holdouts by not paying these guys bank, unless they are worth bank (Seymour for instance -- and the rest of that D line soon, unless we're idiots and tie our hands financially with a flavor-of-the year cornerback.)
So guys who differ with the Pats on valuation try to get out, and use the holdout as their "nuclear weapon." There seems to be no appreciation that the team can, in fact, go the mutual assured destruction route. Belichick fan says franchise him twice and get what value you can out of him. That's probably the extent of it, the twisting slowly in the wind scenario. It's even possible to sit him even if he does show, but that is the "cutting off your nose to spite you face" type of reaction.
Point is, at some point you aren't spiting your face... you're protecting the team into future years.
Okay, either way, the first, fastest move might be to demand huge value for the guy, along the lines of the Branch model -- but surprise, surprise, INSIST on that value. Two 1s, or from a team that picks high in the draft, a 1 and a 2, maybe. Something sky-high. If some jackass pays it, so much the better. More likely not.
Or refuse to trade his rights at all. Basically tell him, dude, you WILL play under the terms of the tender, unless you want to play for the Toronto Argonauts or someone.
Like BeliFan says, do that 2 years in a row, and watch him trying to explain his 12 combined regular season games, most likely with unspectacular results, over two years.
One other point - a negotiation is a negotiation, sure. Business is business.
All I see is that Samuel expects to be paid as if he is the best in the game, and refuses to acknowledge the Pats' risk that he just had a really good half a year, and a statistically anomolous 07, interception-wise.
He wants to indemnify himself against HIS risk of getting injured.
He wants security, again, indemnifying himself against risk of declining value.
He wants lots of cash up front, loading the risk on the team.
This is all just "smart business," the same way it is "smart business" for me to tell you I would like to sell my house for a million bucks, even though it is appraised at 500K.
If you buy it, it's smart business.
If you don't, I have screwed myself, if in fact I really want to divest that asset, because there will never be a contract, and I'll be sitting in that same big ol' empty house, watching other people play football on Sunday. How's that for mixing all the metaphors into a big pot of tailgate chili?
So I guess the only point is, charge out the ass in trade value for Samuel. If nobody ponies up,
refuse to trade his butt.
Let him hold out, and not "get paid" for 2/3 of the year.
Obliquely,
PFnV