I'm still looking forward to ANYONE who can offer a reasonable example of how the Pats were going to be able to franchise Jimmy
A while back I read where Miguel estimated that the Pats would have around $13MM in cap space going into 2018, and that was before Gronk and other hit their incentives (some which are team success based, like winning the SB), so it could be as low as around $10MM.
So just off the top of my head, if the franchise tag for QB's is around $27MM, then the Pats would roughly have cut $17MM in contracts. You CANNOT do that without damaging your team, but it could be done. I guess you can cut Gillislee, Branch, let go Solder and a few others. THEN after that there would be no money to sign any of our own FA's so you can say goodbye to Butler, Badimosi, Burkhead, Lewis, Waddle as well as Solder. Cooks gets about a $5MM raise if we give him the 5th year extension, but can we afford it. And THEN the subject of other team's FA's are simply out of the question. ALL for a QB with 6 quarters of starting experience (at the time).
And after all that carnage with no reinforcements, you are vastly weaker team for a player you don't ever expect to be on the field in 2018. Tell me how THAT makes any sense.
It drive me NUTS when I keep hearing media pukes like Volin saying that Franchising JG was a real possibility. MAYBE it would be a possibility in another dimension, but not THIS one.
Now I did that off the top of my head. If anyone has a better suggestion, I'd be happy to hear it.