Quote:
Originally Posted by nate505
I get the salary comparison, but that one is not quite the same. For one small bonuses like that are a drop in the bucket for an NFL team's revenue stream. There's not much loss for the team if they have to fork over another million to a player for just playing him.
Now, what if there were some real tangible reward for the team to sit the player for that last game? Like the team gets more cap space the next year or something if player X doesn't hit his bonus this year. At that point how much would we see the honor vs. the team benefit?
The bargain in this case is Wentz playing 75% of his snaps. That's it. The hope for the Colts is that he would be good enough and they would be in playoff contention. So far the first part is true...so far the latter part remains to be seen if it's true. If they are in playoff contention in a weak ass AFC South in Week 11, yeah, of course you play him. If they are 1-9 then...why play him? At that point he could get hurt and then you run the risk of having a hurt QB (who was playing in meaningless games) and not having a very high draft pick to brunt the damage to yourself. And at that point the Eagles will have got a high second round pick, so it's not like they got screwed on the deal here. On no planet is Carson Wentz worth a Top 5 pick.
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You’re a bit of a moving target on this. Are you saying sit him just to save the draft pick, or sit him for other reasons? Those are two different things. If there are other legitimate reasons to sit Wentz that happen to also save the draft pick (injury, poor performance, etc.), then so be it. That’s fair game. And if the Colts are 1-9, then it’s somewhat unlikely (though admittedly not impossible) that Wentz will have been playing great. Perhaps you can make a credible argument at that point that the Colts need to explore other options and see how the team performs with a different QB. Again, in my view that means playing a prospect, not a retread. And you need to factor in the damage that this would cause to your long term relationship with Wentz.
The critical point is that you can’t sit him solely to save the draft pick. I’m not saying you have to play Wentz just
because it will enable you to forfeit the 1st round pick, but you do need to deal with the other teams in good faith and handle Wentz the same regardless of whether the 1st round pick hangs in the balance. As Omaha said, you let the chips fall where they may.
Moreover, though some might disagree, even if your intentions are pure and you decide to sit Wentz for some reason that isn’t obvious, I think you also need to be aware of how it will look to other teams, and balance the desire to sit Wentz with any potential damage to public perception. For the Eagles, this has played out ideally so far – Wentz has played pretty well (so no reason to sit him), yet the Colts have been losing (given them a higher draft pick). If you pull the rug out from beneath them and try to sit Wentz for no good reason, they’ll never forgive you and other teams will certainly take note of this treatment as well.
Lastly, in my player contract example, the voluntary $1M bonus would absolutely come from the team’s future salary cap - the rules don't let you pay a player without taking away from your cap - so teams are doing this despite the negative impact on their cap (and I disagree that $1M is a drop in the bucket).