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The league will never give up the franchise tag. The best the NFLPA can hope for is a way to increase the tender offer to make it more attractive for players to get tagged.
If I'm not mistaken, wasn't the franchise tag originally instituted because the owners feared free agents would flock to the big market teams, in part due to the theory that the big market teams would simply outbid the smaller market teams for the best free agents?I think they have to do something though.
The tag now has the perception of the team doing something evil to the player rather than the excersizing of a collectively bargained right.
Just today, someone said kinda off the cuff, well of course Wilfork had a right to be upset when they tagged him.
The tag seems to have become a means for a player to act violated, hold out and demand a trade, rather than a way for the team to ensure they can keep players with unreasonable demands.
If that was the case, then perhaps the exclusive rights franchise tag has outlived its original purpose. The salary cap has a much larger affect on where players do and don't go. At this point the biggest use of the tag is to get one more year of service out of a player, or to buy time to work out a contract extension. In addition restricted free agent tags are almost useless; how often do you see another team willing to give up their draft picks to sign a RFA?