As more and more draft picks sign their rookie contracts, weeks before the negotiating process even began in past seasons, there’s a potential drawback to doing the deals so early.
As Alex Marvez of FOXSports.com recently explained it, first-year players will have money at a time when they still have plenty of time to spend it.
“This is going to be the first time the league is going to have to deal with the challenge of rookie players having a significant amount of money during the offseason,” Falcons director of player programs Kevin Winston told Marvez. “It’s a real big deal.”
One way around this dynamic comes from the deferred signing bonus, a device that some teams are using not to keep the rookies out of trouble but in recognition of the reality that the cash flow ebbs when games aren’t being played. Thus, it could be in the best interests both of the team and the player to push the pay date at least until the point where the player is otherwise occupied with training camp.
And this is as good a place as any to paste the mini-TV-thing that will play Thursday’s segment of PFT Live featuring Mike Chappell of the Indianapolis Star, who among other things discussed the status of contract talks between the Colts and the first pick in the draft, quarterback Andrew Luck.