Drew Brees tries to smooth over Saints-Jimmy Graham riff on Twitter
 

Now that Super Bowl week has passed, Drew Brees doesn’t have a desk to jump on and profess his love for Jimmy Graham. In its stead, he has taken to Twitter to help smooth over the whole Saints-Graham-franchise tag mess going down in NOLA.

If you’re unfamiliar with the situation, here’s a cliff notes version: the Saints are expected to put a franchise tag on Graham in order to negotiate a longterm contract. Though his official position is tight end, Graham wants to be franchised as a wide receiver. He would make roughly $6.8M for one year under the tight end designation; $11.6M as a receiver. The argument being that Graham is the team’s best receiving option, thus he should be paid more.

Brees comes in because he makes a boatload of money ($11M in 2014; $19M in 2015; $20M in 2016), which hamstrings the Saints from signing other star players (Graham) to lucrative deals. However, Graham is Brees’ best weapon, and the QB needs his big target.

So how do you cut through all the lawyers, contracts, negotiations and egos: by posting well-intentioned, kinda weird recruiting messages on Twitter, of course.

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Re: Drew Brees tries to smooth over Saints-Jimmy Graham riff on Twitter
 

I hate the offseason.

Re: Drew Brees tries to smooth over Saints-Jimmy Graham riff on Twitter
 

Another poorly written article.

Where is Graham been quoted as wanting to be tagged as a WR?

Re: Drew Brees tries to smooth over Saints-Jimmy Graham riff on Twitter
 

You'll never see a quote from the man himself. His agent however?

I'm sure that most fans will disagree with me. Jimmy (and his agent) should try to get every penny they can. The NFL is a short lived existence that can be over in the blink of an eye. It's not like baseball or basketball where the entire contract is guaranteed. In fact it's a virtual certainty that any big money contract will either not be paid completely or will get restructured in the NFL. It's the nature of the business.

As tough as it is for fans to understand there is a difference in the playing of football and the business of football. The former is everyone is in for the team. The latter is everyone is in for themselves.

It's just business. So I ain't mad about it. Jimmy deserves every penny he gets.

SFIAH

Re: Drew Brees tries to smooth over Saints-Jimmy Graham riff on Twitter
 

Agreed

Value is subjective, and it's never more or less that what someone is willing to give.

Personally, I hope he gets 100m somewhere else. This team won a SuperBowl with out him and if he wants over 6-7m/year I hope we win another with out him. If he wants to be a Saint that has a price also.

Never underestimate the power and value of a good organization.

There are a few NFL Teams and cities I wouldn't take a few million to spend 5 years in.

Re: Drew Brees tries to smooth over Saints-Jimmy Graham riff on Twitter
 

No doubt.

Re: Drew Brees tries to smooth over Saints-Jimmy Graham riff on Twitter
 

Drew's contract will make it difficult......but not impossible to keep Jimmy.