Quote:
Originally Posted by rm1369
Out of all the stuff I worry about with him, not being motivated because he got a short term contract isn’t one of them. I don’t think what you are suggesting will happen, but the bigger issue is that what you are saying the team possibly lost out on (an unusually motivated, therefore good Jacoby) is exactly what the hell I don’t want. You think this contract hurts the team? Shit, let Jacoby play great, sign a big contract, then loose motivation and coast. That would effect the team magnitudes more than this contract and for many years. If you believe what you wrote then it’s a reason the extension was a good move, not a bad one! The reality is the extension puts more pressure on Jacoby to be good and show improvement. He is facing a huge payday and the team just said - we believe you, but prove it.
This contract was about the long term - the exact thing you’ve been telling me Ballard was building for. I told you before that a major reason I didn’t completely like Ballard’s frugalness was because of the presence of Luck. He’s gone now. So now it makes a lot more sense to me to take a longer term approach because I don’t believe Jacoby is yet capable of winning a SB. Ballard took the steps necessary to make sure he makes the right long term decision on Jacoby. He’s being smart and cautious with it. For the life of me, I can’t understand how you of all people are now saying “yeah, but what about this year”.
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You make many good points, and I’ll say at the outset that appreciate the direct response to my comments and questions rather than a response like “I’m done talking about this”. And I’ll admit my response to vervjones was somewhat rash, as I did it quickly but was trying to point out that you’ve got to weigh the costs and benefits of the two approaches. Long term, sustained excellence is the goal, absolutely, but that doesn’t mean every contract has to be long term. In my view, when you are dealing with an unproven player, you have two choices.
Choice one is you let the guy play for this year under his original contract, see if he does well, and extend him if you feel it’s a good idea. Benefits of this approach include the fact that you get much more intel on the guy, you have a lower financial commitment , the guy has every motivation in the world to work hard and play his best, and you aren’t committed if he doesn’t work out. Negatives are that if he plays well, it will be expensive to resign him, and you may have to use the franchise tag if he negotiates too hard. He may also feel the team isn’t behind him because they haven’t extended him (though I really don’t think this is reasonable because no unproven player should feel entitled to an extension).
Choice two is you sign him to an extension before he proves himself. Benefits of this approach are all the things that Oldcolt said a few posts above. You’ve locked him in at a below-market price (questionable here, but ok), reward a player you like, create some goodwill and a feeling of stability. Negatives are that if the guy doesn’t work out or underperforms, you burn cap space and due to the financial commitment may feel compelled to keep playing the guy longer than you would otherwise, and you run the risk that the guy may lose motivation after receiving a big payday. (Feel free to added to the positives and negatives of each, as I probably missed a few.)
What’s the best long term strategy for success? It depends on the player and the situation – there’s no one-size-fits-all solution. In this case, particularly with a position as important as QB, I prefer option one. As everyone is quick to point out, we have lots of cap space, so we don’t
need to roll the dice and take on the risk that he won’t be the right guy. We can afford to let him play for a year to determine whether he’s what we’re looking for. If we have to pay more at the end, it’s not a terrible thing. I think one of the misconceptions people have of me here is that I’m all about saving money, but that’s really not it – I just want to manage our money better than everyone else so it effectively becomes a competitive advantage. Making a large financial commitment to an unproven player at a position as important as QB doesn’t make a lot of sense to me – particularly given that he hasn’t inspired a great deal of excitement in his prior trial runs.
Now, I 'm not saying Ballard was reckless here. He seems to be straddling the line between the approaches with the Brissett contract. He didn’t sign him to a long extension, so he’s not locked in to Brissett for too long, and he nevertheless rewarded a player he likes, provided some stability and goodwill. All good things. And I admitted elsewhere that I could understand and agree with this rationale, but I just thought he paid too much given the circumstances.