With the new rookie wage scale leaving little to be negotiated, the drama of when (or if) a first-round pick will sign his contract will disappear from the new-look NFL.
Still, fans of a given team will still exhale once their team’s first-rounder(s) are under contract.
In New Orleans, a first-rounder with a fairly recognizable name who recently escaped injury in a collision with a fairly large truck has come to terms. Running back Mark Ingram, the 2009 Heisman Trophy winner, is officially a Saint, per a league source. The first three years of the four-year deal are guaranteed. Like all first-round picks, there’s a fifth-year option.
First-round picks are signing left and right as camps open. As former Ravens coach and current FOX/NFL Network analyst Brian Billick said during Friday’s PFT Live, the rash of signing in a compressed time frame proves that these deals can get done quickly.
The lack of anything about which to seriously negotiate, and thus disagree, adds to that reality.