Last week the San Francisco 49ers gave Colin Kaepernick a $126 million contract making him the latest quarterback to top the $100 million mark. Kaepernick becomes the 8th member of an elite club of players whose contracts have hit 9 figures. Now these are all potential values of contracts none of these players have been given $100 million plus in guaranteed money but it is a trend which has seen the franchise quarterbacks price set at upwards of that $100 million mark.
$100 million QB Club
Kaepernick’s deal is not thehighest in the NFL. At $126,700,000 the Chicago Bears Jay Cutler still holds that honour after signing his deal earlier this summer. Both Kaepernick and Cutler’s deals speak volumes about how hard it is to find a franchise quarterback and that once teams have a guy they believe in, they will have to pay the price to keep him or else someone else will. Teams are now having to give contracts to players who might not be considered top tier due to the drop off to what else is available to the teams.
There are only a few potential franchise quarterbacks that come through the draft each year and those that are an instant success are even rarer. For every Cam Newton or Andrew Luck there is a Blaine Gabbert, Christian Ponder, Josh Freedman or Mark Sanchez. Cutler, Matt Ryan and Tony Romo are three players who all have $100 million contracts, yet none of whom have been to the Superbowl. Both Ryan and Cutler have made appearances in the NFC Championship game, yet their ability makes them a franchise quarterback with the potential to make the playoffs and perhaps take them all the way to the Vince Lombardi trophy.
Question marks about the ability of all three men to win the big one remain but each can point to a fellow member of the $100 million club who dealt with those questions by winning it all. Joe Flacco, who took the Ravens to Superbowl XLVII, beating Kaepernick and the 49ers in the process, dealt with questions on whether or not he was a true “Elite” quarterback but won it all and put at least some of those doubts to rest.
A side effect of having to pay $100 million for your franchise quarterback is that you are then committed to him both on the field and off it. Salary cap constraints mean that locking up your franchise quarterback may mean letting some of the weapons he relies on go. Teams that draft well and have a young nucleus of the team, such as the Seattle Seahawks, are much more flexible when it comes to being able to surround those players with experienced veterans through free agents, however the window the team has together will be limited, and as the time comes to extend these players teams like the Seahawks will have some tough choices to make on who to invest their future in.
The handful of teams that have young quarterbacks who have performed well in their short time in the league will have big decisions to make as these players will be expecting 9 figure deals when their rookie contracts expire. Players like Andrew Luck and Cam Newton seem certain to get the big pay day but some of those players who have question marks about them will pose real dilemmas for their teams. Andy Dalton is one such player who his franchise, the Cincinnati Bengals, will have to make a call on. In three seasons with Dalton under center the Bengals have made the playoffs in each only to be eliminated at the first hurdle each time. Are the Bengals willing to invest $100 million in a guy who might have reached his ceiling, and if not what are the alternatives? And are they any better?
The NFL franchise quarterback has had its price set and that price is over $100 million. Teams will have the length of a player’s rookie contract to decide whether or not they have the guy they truly want to make a big investment or if it is time to move in another direction. This could lead to franchises over reaching on players who might not have the ability to match the contract given, and if and when that happens it will be a costly mistake that goes down with Jamarcus Russell and Albert Hainsworth in the most expensive mistakes in NFL history, not only costing Coaches and General Managers their jobs but a franchise years of being hamstrung as they carry the dead money while trying to rebuild.
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