Monday Money Matters

With old friend Plaxico Burress dominating the headlines again for the wrong reasons, the state of New York is now involved and will certainly take the matter seriously to avoid perception of favorable treatment to a celebrity athlete -- with the real possibility of Burress serving jail time.  He will now have the charges read against him and will enter a not guilty plea (it will be interesting to see what his defense will be, as it clearly appears he did not have a state-required gun permit).

The Giants have a few options but will likely take their lead from the league in the invocation of the Personal Conduct Policy.  Meanwhile, the injury sustained from his apparent self-inflicted gunshot is obviously a non-football injury, making him a candidate for the NFI (Non-Football Injury) list.  With four games remaining, this list would be season ending, and the Giants would have no obligation to pay Burress his salary – $117,500 per game -- for the time he is on the list.  A suspension, however, would make NFI irrelevant, since Burress would not be paid for any time on suspension.

As for recovering a previously paid bonus on his contract extension at the start of the season, that will be a difficult road for the Giants, with thorny precedent from cases involving Michael Vick and Terrell Owens.

As I’ve said many times in this space, as much as management and coaches want players to change, very few actually do.  Players like Plaxico, Pacman, Ocho Cinco, etc., do not change.  They will always be distractions and shame on those who think they will.  Much more on this developing story to come…..

The Texans pulled the plug on Ahman Green last week and placed him on season-ending injured reserve.  Ahman is a longtime friend and was a wonderful player during our time in Green Bay, gaining more than 1,150 yards five years in a row from 2000-2004. Our decision in 2007 not to re-sign him turned out to be the right one.  As I detailed in this space earlier, when Ahman took a pay reduction to remain with the Texans this season, it was an emotional day on March 10, 2007 (in a blizzard) when I spent hours trying to convince Ahman and his agent to take less money in Green Bay, an area he liked and where he owned two homes, rather than take his services to Houston for the money.

The key number that gave us pause with the contract offer he had from Houston was the two-year number: $11 million. That was too much for us to swallow. He was a productive, longtime star for us, but in the end, he was a running back about to turn 30.  Now there are constant reminders about the perils of paying significant dollars to older backs (see James, Edgerrin and Alexander, Shaun).

For that $11M, the Texans have received the following statistical achievements:

14 games played, 144 carries, 554 yards (almost $20,000 a yard) and five touchdowns.  With Ahman turning 32 in February, it is unlikely he will see the final three years of the five-year contract he signed with Houston on that snowy day 18 months ago.

Ahman is a truly good person who made great contributions to the Packers.  If and when the Texans release him in three months, I strongly suspect his first call will be to Green Bay…….

Speaking of Green Bay, the Packers’ decision to select Ahmad Carroll over Chris Gamble in the first round of the 2004 NFL Draft does not look so good today.  Carroll was a smallish cornerback out of Arkansas who made some truly “wow” plays on tape with his exceptional speed.  Gamble was a more complete, albeit slower, player out of Ohio State whom the Panthers snatched up a couple picks after we took Carroll.  The results have been striking.

We released him after a game in which he was exposed against Philadelphia on a Monday night in October 2006 (we took on $1.8M in cap acceleration for 2007 by releasing Carroll).  He is now a special-teams player for the Jets.   Gamble has started every game since coming into the league and – the reason I am bringing this up – just signed an extension with the Panthers. The rookie contract he signed in 2004 was five games from expiring after its five-year term.

Agent Carl Poston says Gamble’s contract makes him one of the top five highest-paid cornerbacks in the league and is worth over $50M, with close to $23M in guaranteed money.   I know Carl well, having dealt with him on Charles Woodson, and he is prone to a bit of hyperbole, not unlike many in the business.  Regardless, the Panthers are fortunate that the Packers took Carroll over Gamble and now have rewarded Gamble with a top-of-the-market contract to go along with the top-of-the-market free agent contract they gave to Ken Lucas a couple of years back……

The Panthers’ contract challenges are far from over.  They allowed three of their top players – now two – to reach the end of their contracts without agreeing to extensions.  Julius Peppers and Jordan Gross have expiring contracts and happen to play two of the most expensive positions – defensive end and offensive tackle.  The certainly have the ability to franchise one of them, with the cap consequences of such a move.  Gross is playing with the franchise tag this year at $7.455M, and that is likely to rise by 5-10 percent.  The tag number for defensive ends this year was $8.8M – calculated in part due to Peppers’ $11.735M salary and $14M cap charge.  Peppers has 11 sacks and counting in this all-important contract year.

For 2009, the Panthers presently have $97M in cap commitments on what is projected to be a $123M Cap.  So cap availability should not be an issue.

Cash will be another story.  It will be hard for owner Jerry Richardson to fund cash commitments to Gamble, Gross and Peppers without some heavy deferrals in their guarantees.  The likely scenario is keeping the franchise tag on Gross or moving it to Peppers, depending on the state of negotiations with the two come mid-February.  Either way, 2009 will be a cash-heavy year for the Panthers.

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