BobDigital
Pro Bowl Player
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- Aug 10, 2013
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So a post today made me think it was time to do some research into Brady's contract history and compare him to other top QBs.
I tried to find QBs of similar skill and career arch so the only 2 I could really choose were Brees and Peyton Manning. Another issue with this is trying to find cap numbers. Brady's are easy enough to find thanks to Miguel's work but the others are much more difficult. In fact I was missing a few years so I was forced to take another tact.
I used the site Spotract to track total cash earnings of Brady, Manning & Brees over their careers.
Now the issue with doing it this way is they have played a different number of years and the rookies deals offered a big discrepancy. Also I could not just pick a year and start there cause the signing date is the single biggest number in cash earnings and I would either have to include rookie deal years for some players or miss the signing bonus for others. So what I settled on (and this was imperfect but the best way I could figure) is go from the first major contract after the rookie deals for each player on.
For Manning this is 2004 on
http://www.spotrac.com/nfl/denver-broncos/peyton-manning/cash-earnings/
For Brady this is 2005 on
http://www.spotrac.com/nfl/new-england-patriots/tom-brady/cash-earnings/
(Brady got a minor extension and 2002 but I choose to ignore it as it would be unfair I thought and skew the numbers too much in his favor)
For Brees it was 2006 on
http://www.spotrac.com/nfl/new-orleans-saints/drew-brees/cash-earnings/
After this I subtract the early rookie deal year numbers from total earnings and divided by total years for each player after that point to get an average after the first big contract.
Here are the numbers
Manning from 2004 on made 16.58 per year in cash earnings
Brady from 2005 on made 13.08 per year in cash earnings
Brees from 2006 on made 13.15 per year in cash earnings.
Brady made 78.9% of what Manning made post rookie deals.
Brady made 99.4% of what Brees made post rookie deals.
If you average Brees and Manning's numbers together Brady made 88% of what a other QBs of his caliber have made over that same time frame.
This tells me over his post rookie career Brady has taken a 12% pay cut if you want to go by the way I did it. You can also argue he should have made more than Brees or Manning if you want meaning his pay cut could perhaps even be considered bigger than that.
Now I know this way of looking at it is not perfect and welcome other ways of viewing his contract viewed against others. I think we can all agree however he has been quite a steal.
I tried to find QBs of similar skill and career arch so the only 2 I could really choose were Brees and Peyton Manning. Another issue with this is trying to find cap numbers. Brady's are easy enough to find thanks to Miguel's work but the others are much more difficult. In fact I was missing a few years so I was forced to take another tact.
I used the site Spotract to track total cash earnings of Brady, Manning & Brees over their careers.
Now the issue with doing it this way is they have played a different number of years and the rookies deals offered a big discrepancy. Also I could not just pick a year and start there cause the signing date is the single biggest number in cash earnings and I would either have to include rookie deal years for some players or miss the signing bonus for others. So what I settled on (and this was imperfect but the best way I could figure) is go from the first major contract after the rookie deals for each player on.
For Manning this is 2004 on
http://www.spotrac.com/nfl/denver-broncos/peyton-manning/cash-earnings/
For Brady this is 2005 on
http://www.spotrac.com/nfl/new-england-patriots/tom-brady/cash-earnings/
(Brady got a minor extension and 2002 but I choose to ignore it as it would be unfair I thought and skew the numbers too much in his favor)
For Brees it was 2006 on
http://www.spotrac.com/nfl/new-orleans-saints/drew-brees/cash-earnings/
After this I subtract the early rookie deal year numbers from total earnings and divided by total years for each player after that point to get an average after the first big contract.
Here are the numbers
Manning from 2004 on made 16.58 per year in cash earnings
Brady from 2005 on made 13.08 per year in cash earnings
Brees from 2006 on made 13.15 per year in cash earnings.
Brady made 78.9% of what Manning made post rookie deals.
Brady made 99.4% of what Brees made post rookie deals.
If you average Brees and Manning's numbers together Brady made 88% of what a other QBs of his caliber have made over that same time frame.
This tells me over his post rookie career Brady has taken a 12% pay cut if you want to go by the way I did it. You can also argue he should have made more than Brees or Manning if you want meaning his pay cut could perhaps even be considered bigger than that.
Now I know this way of looking at it is not perfect and welcome other ways of viewing his contract viewed against others. I think we can all agree however he has been quite a steal.
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