SmashMouth

Saints second-round quarterback Tyler Shough is demanding a fully-guaranteed rookie contract of his own

AsylumGuido

Or more precisely, Shough's agent is demanding a fully guaranteed contract. To be fair, only two of the 32 2nd round picks (#33 and #34) have been signed to date. As a comparison, only three of the 32 1st rounders remain unsigned and all 38 of the 3rd rounders have signed. Every agent out there is making the same demand for 2nd rounders to have the same guarantees as round one. Carson Schwesinger and Jayden Higgins, the two signed 2nd rounders, both received fully guaranteed contracts.

stickman

Which is why every other 2nd rounder is demanding it. Which, to be honest, I can't blame them for. An agent has got to work for his client.

neugey

Unless he holds out (unlikely since he's competing for QB1 and needs all reps) it doesn't matter too much.

saintsfan1976

I can see both sides.

But if we're guaranteeing money, what guarantee does the franchise receive in exchange?

AsylumGuido

I suppose that the agent doesn't hold the player out. But realistically, 2nd rounder salaries are only $1.79 million to $2.95 million a year over the four year term of the contract and a decent percentage of them make and stay with the team for the short haul, at least. That's really not that much to guarantee in the scheme of things.

WW_Who_Dat

It’s all about the precident, once the contract money is guaranteed that money has to be put into an escrow account and the team needs to account for in annual Cap projections. It can be a serious cash constraint for some teams/owners.

AsylumGuido

I believe that Gayle can cover that minimal 2nd round guarantee annually if needed. I'm seeing she's now worth $7.88 billion. That said, that "funding rule" appears to have a rather fuzzy definition.

Setting a New Standard for Guaranteed Contracts

From the article above ...

That did not happen. But we may have hit a turning point with the Cleveland Browns and Deshaun Watson. For years, clubs have told agents that a main reason for not guaranteeing contracts was the “funding rule” – an archaic league rule that says teams must put into escrow an amount of money equal to what they are guaranteeing a player in any contract beyond the first year.

Thanks to Jimmy Haslam and Andrew Berry of the Browns for doing what other NFL owners and executives have mostly been unwilling to do, despite comments and reports of other NFL owners bemoaning the move. We once again have proof that the funding rule is an artificial barrier to guaranteed money, and credit to David Mulugheta, Watson’s agent, for working with our union to push past it.

“The pessimist sees difficulty in every opportunity. The optimist sees the opportunity in every difficulty.” — Winston Churchill

BakoSaint

We shouldnt have to be the team that caves on guarantees for the whole league. Realistically maybe Shough is great or maybe he is the next Christian Hackenburg or Josh Rosen. If he is a bust or continues to be injured those guarantees will hurt. I am sure Gayle has the money, but the salary cap still has limits, and as we saw with Zack Baun, teams can do a lot with a few million.