Sometimes Its Who You Keep Not Who You Sign

[BigHairedAristocrat]

Originally Posted by SmootSmack

Dockery was asking for a shitload of money, if I recall correctly it was around a $17 million signing bonus. Interesting point about Thomas.



Who'd have known Archuleta would have been so terrible. But Williams insisted, I thought Arch was overrated but my gosh he was terrible. Even Gibbs, who could find good in just about everyone, thought he was a waste



Fair point

I was excited about AA at the time, but evidently people who know more about football than me thought it was a horrible move and that he was a bad fit for our system. That point aside, everyone who had half a brain realized that we were giving him waaaaaay to big of a contract. his potential as a SS aside, he was just coming off a back injury and his own team didnt want him. He only got sniffs from a couple other teams and we give him the biggest contract ever for a safety?... we can blame Williams for wanting AA in the first place, but i'm pretty sure Williams had nothing to do with the obscene 30M/10Mgaraunteed we gave AA to sign. I place that squarely on our FO.

As far as Dockery goes, I seem to remember the skins and dockery were both squabbling over a difference in garaunteed money, but Dock wasnt even asking for more than 12M or so, which was entirely reasonable at the the time.... but once Dock hit free agency (where there were very few free agent guards available and the cap had just risen enormously), he ended up getting well more than he had ever dreamed - over 18M garaunteed if i remember correctly. If the skins had judged the market correctly, i am positive they would have locked up dockery when they had the chance.

My point is unless we're dealing with someone who is clearly being unreasonable, we should work to extend our own young guys when we can - if theyre good, of course.

For example, I think we should give Hall his 16M garaunteed before he has the opportunity to taste the market. He will make over 20 if he hits the open market. Is that alot? - yes. But he'll be the #2corner available and anyone who doesnt want to give that oakland dude 30M+ garaunteed would gladly pay Hall 20-22.