Samuel wants to stay a Patriot...

[Hamtown]

ASANTE SAMUEL. You are a great CB, true. We would love to have you stay. We still love you. We think you are the MAN! But this is New England my friend. If you dont want to sacrifice for the team and settle for a 15,000 square foot house instead of a 16,000 square foot house, or settle for a 2008 Bentley instead of a 2009 or settle for a 125 karat diamond watch instead of that same old 100 karat rolex, then we understand. We the fans especially can relate, man just last week I had to decide between a new set of tires for my truck or a refurbished set to get me through the winter. Dam that day care bill, and that darn heating bill, and not to mention gas money! WOW! But I know you can relate. Thanks for reminding us all what's important. I am sure Eric Mangina and you will fit in great, maybe you can both get together and watch illegal Jets Videos. But again, were behind you and wish you would stay. ELLIS HOBBS Rocks! GO PATS!

 

[borisman]

He says his chances of staying are a "10". He also says he wants huge money. Basically, he's trying to tell other teams that he wants to stay with Pats unless you give me the richest contract for a CB ever, that the Pats aren't able to match. And it will happen so "get rich to that", Asante.

 

[fgssand]

Re: Samuel wants to stay a Patriot ...

i like that idea. either assante is gone imho.

I don't think Ty Law is what he was in 2001 (who is) - However, keeping Asante AND signing Law would work for me.

 

[PatsFanInVa]

A lot of guys here are high on Asumogha (sp?)

I know we have a fake Eckel deal out there for 5M odd dollars. That's not happening and all concerend know it. Other than that, there are always the cap-shifting moves, the adjusted cap impact, etc.

I mean, we would have the option of paydays hitting for Asante in the future (if he will accept that, although the security of NOW seems to play a big part in his decisions...) We're still looking for a way to get 80million bucks accounted for over eight years, and guaranteed money for a lot of it, if we're believing that he thinks he's Nate Clement. Let's call it 22 now, 58 in salary, eight year deal (I think that's what Clement got)...

So 22 over 8 (calling it all signing bonus for sake of simplicity,) is 2.75M every year for the proration, for 8 years (or until cut, of course.)

That leaves an average salary of 7.25M to deal with. Of course, the APY will always be 10M/yr in an 8/80 deal. But let's say ol' A$ante can give us three years at salary of 3M, 4M, 6M. That takes a total of 13M off the 58, leaving 45 to be paid in 5 years.

So we'd get 2008 for 5.75 cap money, 2009 for 6.75, 2010 for 8.75 -- all very reasonable (the 2010 figure will be reasonable by 2010.)

And $ante gets to tell his friends he got Clement money.

The "out years" of the contract, of course, would leave 2.75M per year dead cap money for as long as there is a cap, or through 2015, whichever comes first, even if we cut A$ante. For every year we keep him after the first three, we'd be on the hook for an average of $9M in salary plus the 2.75M prorate.

But we could get to 2010 with something like the above formula. Hardly bargain basement, but if you like what he does for us, it's manageable. The average $11.75M for year 4 onward might not look quite as bad in an Uncapped future -- though that may never happen. If he plays at perenniel pro bowl level, sure, we may keep him for a couple years on these terms, but he'll probably be in restructureland at some point soon after the "cheap" years of the deal.

I wonder how many guys will get cut and reshuffled if the great Uncapped Future never comes into being... seems like people will be thinking about that every time they cut a deal these days.

PFnV

 

[TN Patriot]

It would be a better idea to front load any big contract, history has genreally shown, most cap problems come with backloaded deals, once teams get to that part of the contract and either don't want to pay it, they ask to restructure, time and time again, the big number doesn't go away.
Steve McNair's contract while in TN was done like this, he restructured a few times toward the end of his tenure in TN. It's ultimately what got him shipped out when he finally said I want my payday.

 

[MoLewisrocks]

A lot of guys here are high on Asumogha (sp?)

I know we have a fake Eckel deal out there for 5M odd dollars. That's not happening and all concerend know it. Other than that, there are always the cap-shifting moves, the adjusted cap impact, etc.

I mean, we would have the option of paydays hitting for Asante in the future (if he will accept that, although the security of NOW seems to play a big part in his decisions...) We're still looking for a way to get 80million bucks accounted for over eight years, and guaranteed money for a lot of it, if we're believing that he thinks he's Nate Clement. Let's call it 22 now, 58 in salary, eight year deal (I think that's what Clement got)...

So 22 over 8 (calling it all signing bonus for sake of simplicity,) is 2.75M every year for the proration, for 8 years (or until cut, of course.)

That leaves an average salary of 7.25M to deal with. Of course, the APY will always be 10M/yr in an 8/80 deal. But let's say ol' A$ante can give us three years at salary of 3M, 4M, 6M. That takes a total of 13M off the 58, leaving 45 to be paid in 5 years.

So we'd get 2008 for 5.75 cap money, 2009 for 6.75, 2010 for 8.75 -- all very reasonable (the 2010 figure will be reasonable by 2010.)

And $ante gets to tell his friends he got Clement money.

The "out years" of the contract, of course, would leave 2.75M per year dead cap money for as long as there is a cap, or through 2015, whichever comes first, even if we cut A$ante. For every year we keep him after the first three, we'd be on the hook for an average of $9M in salary plus the 2.75M prorate.

But we could get to 2010 with something like the above formula. Hardly bargain basement, but if you like what he does for us, it's manageable. The average $11.75M for year 4 onward might not look quite as bad in an Uncapped future -- though that may never happen. If he plays at perenniel pro bowl level, sure, we may keep him for a couple years on these terms, but he'll probably be in restructureland at some point soon after the "cheap" years of the deal.

I wonder how many guys will get cut and reshuffled if the great Uncapped Future never comes into being... seems like people will be thinking about that every time they cut a deal these days.

PFnV

The fake Eckle deal is likely already accounted for with incentives and escalators (that Miguel knows exist just not the specifics) probably eating up most of that. Randy's incentives alone ate up $2M. BTW Asamugha or however you spell it had option years that he will void and the Raiders have or will tag him.

You can't prorate for 8. 6 is the max. And the Pat's tend to be conservative when it comes to counting chickens before they hatch vis a vis potential cap existence.

They could always make room for a player they want. Just the tradeoff is they have to opt out on someone or something else they may also want. I just don't think Asante represents value at much above what they offered him last time around - a deal that sounded like $6M AAV to the FO but Asante's agent knew was really closer to $5M because it lacked the bonus/guarantees that are all that really matter. I think they were offering him $8-10M in bonus and guarantees, and at the time he wanted $12+ in bonus alone. Now he wants $22M+ (and likely ++++). I think the gap has only widened. The only caveat is what other GM's think he's worth after this season. Because that will ultimately shape his own perception of what he is worth. Down the stretch he looked a little worried about his status. His SB performance can't have helped in that respect. But we will just have to wait to see. Still lots of idiot GM's out there clawing to hang onto their jobs.

 

[PatsFanInVa]

The fake Eckle deal is likely already accounted for with incentives and escalators (that Miguel knows exist just not the specifics) probably eating up most of that. Randy's incentives alone ate up $2M. BTW Asamugha or however you spell it had option years that he will void and the Raiders have or will tag him.

You can't prorate for 8. 6 is the max. And the Pat's tend to be conservative when it comes to counting chickens before they hatch vis a vis potential cap existence.

They could always make room for a player they want. Just the tradeoff is they have to opt out on someone or something else they may also want. I just don't think Asante represents value at much above what they offered him last time around - a deal that sounded like $6M AAV to the FO but Asante's agent knew was really closer to $5M because it lacked the bonus/guarantees that are all that really matter. I think they were offering him $8-10M in bonus and guarantees, and at the time he wanted $12+ in bonus alone. Now he wants $22M+ (and likely ++++). I think the gap has only widened. The only caveat is what other GM's think he's worth after this season. Because that will ultimately shape his own perception of what he is worth. Down the stretch he looked a little worried about his status. His SB performance can't have helped in that respect. But we will just have to wait to see. Still lots of idiot GM's out there clawing to hang onto their jobs.

Thanks for the 8 vs 6 yr prorate info.

What can I say. I keep trying to narrate to myself a "keep Asante scenario," and it seems like his last pronouncement was meant to play on that.

I just don't see it either, regardless of how much we need talent at corner. If he's trying to get much past that 22M guaranteed, what the hell does he think he is? I'm right back where I started: Asante, dude, you are good, not great. You are not Deion Sanders.

This whole "10 out of 10 that he'll play for NE" only points to more of the merry-go-round, I'm afraid -- unless he has some plan for a "fake" blockbuster, so he can brag while still only getting $6-7M APY with a bunch of backloaded salary.

I suppose to theorize a deal that gets him 8/80, >22 up front, 6 year proration, we could say:

- 30 up front over 6 years, for 5M/yr cap hit
- Sal of 2, 2.5, 3, 3.5, 4, 4.5 first 6 years
- cap totals:
08 7M
09 7.5M
'10 8M
'11 8.5M
'12 9 M
'13 9.5 M

These are all in the realm of "I've seen crazier." So that's 19.5M in salaries, and 30M in bonuses, over 6 years (49.5M), leaving 30.5 to (not) pay him over the following 2 years, '13 and '14.

That gives him his Clement deal (even better, more guaranteed money.) It also puts the team on the hook pretty effectively, with a dead money hit of more like 5M/year.

I'm like you, Mo... I don't like loading up that much risk even at a time of trouble at CB. Even scaling back that 30M upfront to 24M upfront (look maw! MORE up-front money than Clement! um but only by 2M), you're still on the hook for 4M in dead money hits if something untoward transpires.

Okay someone tell me how un-kosher this is:

Sign the deal, then shop his contract around, so you control whether he plays in the division?

I'd kinda like to see that, but the fact that it's not done often suggests it's bad juju.

PFnV

 

[Alex24]

but knows it will take a lot to keep him here.

He's worth the cash dont let him go.

 

[PatsFanInVa]

He's worth the cash dont let him go.

Okay... but we do have to face the fact that somebody isn't worth the cash, even with the easily identifiable "restructure or cut" candidates.

So if you really believe he's worth the cash, how do you feel about, say, Randy Moss?

Or, if we keep both of them (of course this can be done... just a matter of what else we do...) you know you run up against some other big decisions... and it gets worse moving forward the next couple of years.

I think it makes sense to think about life without Asante, as well as life with.

PFnV

 

[RayClay]

If I were his agent I'd tell him to shut up, he doesn't help himself.

Having said that, I'd love to have him at the right price, but a couple day one CBs wouldn't break my heart either.

 

[PatsFanInVa]

If I were his agent I'd tell him to shut up, he doesn't help himself.

Having said that, I'd love to have him at the right price, but a couple day one CBs wouldn't break my heart either.

Heh Love the understatement.

At a moment like this, it truly sucks to not have that #31 pick in addition to the 7. We could parlay that into say a #15 and a high second rounder (or a 1st in 09) to go w/the 31. Not that we won't anyway... but that #31 would be great to have in such a scenario.

PFnV