The franchise tag is $13.95mm. Norman (who turns 29 this year) was reportedly asking for $16mm/yr on a long-term deal (guaranteed, I assume). Kuechly (who is 24) makes less than $12.5mm/yr.
Why would he do a Revis deal, when he's not coming off an injury like Revis was? Instead, he has nothing to prove, and as a key member of the defending NFC champions, his stock may never be higher. His biggest payday may be right now.
I agree. The Jags are (believe it or not) easily the best of the three teams who can afford Norman without completely writing off their other needs and/or making painful cuts -- Norman will be on the wrong side of 30 by the time the 49ers or Browns are good again. Caldwell clearly has a mandate to take the long view, but pressure must be starting to build to show results. This feels like the right time to push a big stack of chips into the center of the table.
I don't know about that. The Jags have Amukamara, House and Colvin as their top 3 corners. Not exactly desperate. Norman would be an obvious upgrade but its not a dire need for them.
Because his options are limited when it comes to going somewhere with a chance to win now. Does he take huge money with Jax or SF or sign a lesser deal with a better team(Indy?)and hit FA next year? It's a shitty situation for him to be in at this time of FA.
If he wanted a one-year deal, he would've signed the tag and stayed in Carolina. The few million less he'd make there than elsewhere wouldn't be worth the risk of giving up a good situation.
Some team could always backload a deal.
Apparently to him the few extra million was worth taking a hard line on in a long term deal and it burned him. Who knows if anyone will be willing to pay him what he wants. He might have to settle for that 12-14 million this year and try for his long term deal next year.
Yeah, I don't think a team needs upwards of $14 million in cap room to sign him to a deal he'd regard as better than playing under the franchise tender. I would think you could get it done with $8 million if there's enough guaranteed money in there. Malik Jackson's $85 million deal with over $40 million guaranteed has a $10m cap hit this year.
My impression of the NFL FA market - and reasonable people may differ - is that anyone actually reaching FA is interested in money first, and team culture / winning opportunity only as a tiebreaker between suitors. Norman is one knee ligament away from never getting his big payday. A year from now after a Revis deal, his free-market longterm deal could just as easily be less valuable than it would be today.
I don't think "a chance to win now" is very high on his priority list - if it was he would have tried to work something out with Carolina.
Bingo! He's precisely the kind of whack job who'd want to show some uppity . . player who's boss!
He's one of the most anti-union owners, isn't he? Isn't he the guy who had the bizarre idea at the last labor impasse that he was going to somehow "break" the players union?
I agree with this, but why not keep him for 2016? There has to be more to this...
Norman hadn't signed the tag and presumably wasn't going to report for training camp. If the Panthers did nothing, he likely would have signed just prior to Week 1. I think the Panthers sensibly decided that they would rather spend $14mm elsewhere than pay a player who was likely to be a distraction, and might or might not be as good as he was last year.
Have you seen the other CBs for Carolina? Norman is head and shoulders superior to anyone else on the roster. This hurts the team badly. This is also bad business. You basically get a compensatory pick for a top 5 corner. There may be a Richardson angle as speculated above or the Panthers know something really ugly about Norman. Who cares if you cannot sign him long term, you make him play this year on the tag, the team has a legitimate SB chance.
I think this is probably correct. It's also important to note that Carolina's defense under Rivera has consistently been predicated on the strength of their front seven. Their secondary has been a rotating cast of has-beens and never-weres, yet their defense has continually been one of the best in the league. They probably feel very comfortable that they will continue to be a top unit with or without Norman.
If he signs with another team now, wouldn't the Panthers still be eligible for a compensatory draft pick?
The wording of the original quote was not clear to me. I read that quote as complaining that because they let Norman go, they would not get a compensatory pick.
I now see that the complaint is that they are only getting a compensatory pick when they should have tried to get more, but is there any reason to think that another team would have given up more than that for the right to sign Norman to a long term deal?
They would have had to sign him to the tag. If they did that, why would they want to trade him? They would have gotten a year of elite level play then gotten a 3rd round comp pick for him. That's valuable.
IF the Jags were to sign Norman, they'd likely just keep everyone. They lacked any kind of depth last year. I was just trying to point out that Jacksonville isn't desperate to do anything in their secondary this year. Especially with the addition of Gipson at FS. They're also in good position to draft a couple of impact players on D. They're due to pony up some big contracts in the near future like Bortles, Hurns and Robinson so I'm not sure they would want to fork over the cash to pay for a 28 yr old corner.
Him signing the tag doesn't mean you get a year of elite play from him.
We don't know that he would have held out. Players say they will hold out but when they face the reality of sitting out and not getting paid they usually come back. For example, Chris Johnson and MJD held out of camp looking for new deals and came back right before the season. It takes somebody with as much conviction to stick to their guns on their particular issue such as Logan Mankins or Carson Palmer to hold out into the season.
There's also the documented matter of the racist policies of several of the divisions of Flagstar, his company.
Seahawks did it in 2009 to Leroy Hill, but signed him to a long term deal less than a week after rescinding the tag.
Soxy Brown remains one of the best posters in this forum and this is a good assessment of the situation. Someone is going to overpay Norman into his 30s and regret doing it.
Team can tag, and untag player. It isn't done very often because few teams want to burn all bridges with that player, plus make other players in future think they could be next.
