Starks signs his 1-year contract

by nycsteeler on Feb 21, 2009 8:22 PM EST

The Post-Gazette and ESPN are both reporting that Max Starks has signed the 1-year contract offer he received as the Steelers' franchise player. According to ESPN, this guarantees his entire $8.45 million salary for this season, but prevents him from potentially getting offers from other teams. (That wasn't likely anyway, since any team who signed him would owe the Steelers two first round draft choices.)

Personally, I think this could work out badly for the Steelers for two reasons. One, although the Post-Gazette article indicates that the Steelers can and will still try to negotiate a longer-term deal with Starks, I'm not sure Starks would even want to do that, since now he can take his $8.45 million and then be a free agent next year. Two, it sounds like even if they did reach a longer-term agreement, Starks would still be on the books for the full $8.45 million towards the cap this year, so I don't think there is any way the Steelers still have enough room to sign McFadden now.

Here are the links:

http://www.postgazette.com/pg/09052/950828-100.stm

http://sports.espn.go.com/nfl/news/story?id=3924220

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This is the same as last year

Starks has no motivation whatsoever. The only thing that can help us is if they had a gentleman’s agreement, whatever that’s worth, to get a longer deal done and were close to the details but needed more time. Otherwise, this is deja vu all over again, the same as a two-year 15.5 million contract.

Thoughtful discussion with a sense of history

by maryrose on Feb 21, 2009 9:44 PM EST reply actions

exactly

No motivation whatsoever, especially with the fact that 2010 might even be an uncapped year. I’m hoping that the league and the union are able to strike a deal so that it won’t be, but why wouldn’t Starks wait and see? The more I think about this development the more I don’t like it. 15.5 million for two years is way too much—if they hadn’t franchised him last year they might have been able to sign him for four years at only slightly more cost.

by nycsteeler on Feb 22, 2009 7:25 AM EST up reply actions

sorry, meant to say "transitioned" him last year

by nycsteeler on Feb 22, 2009 7:27 AM EST up reply actions

Uncapped year

The last I heard about that is that the owners would have a lockout before having an uncapped year. Hope they get a deal done this offseason.

by WolfpackSteelersFan on Feb 24, 2009 4:21 PM EST up reply actions

motivation

There is motivation, when you do a long term deal, you make some of that money that is in the base into a signing bonus. Singing bonuses do not count against the cap. It will benefit Starks because he gets the same amount of money and if he gets hurt that money is secure. So if doesn’t he is really putting a lot into not getting hurt, which imo is not a good move. Its not thinking in the long term why not sign a 3 year deal at least worth 12 million dollars with a 5 million dollar signing bonus. Which would mean starks would make 9 million this year with only a 4 million dollar cap hit. So it would benefit starks. Then again if he is waiting for the un-capped year he is risking injury and in the game of football, injuries is apart of the game, which makes it not a smart move. Also I think if he wanted to wait till 2010 they wouldn’t be negotiating.

by tannofsteel84 on Feb 22, 2009 11:24 AM EST reply actions

signing bonus

I’m not an expert in how salaries work in the NFL, but I think that the only part of the contract that is guaranteed is the signing bonus. So Starks would never sign a deal like the 3-year deal you mentioned. He has almost 8.5 million guaranteed for just this year already. For the Steelers to convert some of that into a signing bonus benefits them with regard to the cap, but doesn’t benefit Starks at all.

I agree that injury is a risk, but if it isn’t a smart move to take the guaranteed money for one year, then why do most franchised players do exactly that?

by nycsteeler on Feb 22, 2009 11:44 AM EST up reply actions

A year from now will be Max's motivation

Not now. He’s put $15.5 in the bank in two years as insurance against injury. We said the same things last year, hoping a long-term deal would be worked out. The reason it didn’t get done is that Max had no motivation. This year he’s $8.5 richer with the same lack of motivation.

The only way I se it working is if Max’s agent and the Steelers have already agreed on a framework, in good faith, and they are now ironing out the details. That framework would include maybe a $15 signing bonus spread out over five years. The Steelers would have to pony that up right now (and it seems Dan and Art scraped every nickel to give to their brothers). Max puts $15 in the bank right now instead of $8.5. Otherwise, Max will be motivated next year before someone throws a boatload of guaranteed money at him.

Thoughtful discussion with a sense of history

by maryrose on Feb 22, 2009 1:17 PM EST up reply actions

question

Was the FO able to pull the franchise tag if he didn’t sign the offer sheet? Can’t find that info anywhere, and with the Steelers so rarely using the franchise tag, I have no idea.

by SteelBuckeye on Feb 22, 2009 2:51 PM EST reply actions

I'm almost positive

Which is the reason why Starks signed it. If the club couldn’t pull it there’d be no reason for the player to sign it. Having signed it, Starks now has the upper hand regarding any long-term adjustments.

Thoughtful discussion with a sense of history

by maryrose on Feb 22, 2009 5:26 PM EST up reply actions