Chris Whalen’s Random Life

Ok, so I have been getting allot of questions regarding what the franchise tag is. Mainly around Matt Cassell, so here goes….

With the new s today that Matt Cassell will accept/sign the franchise tag from the Patriots, this is what it means. There are two type of franchsie tags, exclusive and non-exclusive.  Exclusive means, that’s it, once the player signs it you own him for the year unless you trade him. THat means the value of the contract will be the average of the top 5 players at that players position, in Cassell’s case about $14.7 Million for one year. Generally teams that actually want to keep this player use the exclusive tag….

THe Patriots offered the non-exclusive tag. The salary number is the same but the main difference is that other teams can negotiate with the player and offer a better or longer term deal. If the player accepts it the new team owes the old team (Patriots) two first round draft picks as compensation. With the high value of picks in the NFL, the reality is this gives Cassell the opportunity to negotiate a new deal for himself and work our compensation/trade with the Patriots. The non-exclusive tag acts as the door opener and guarantees compensation for the Pats. The only caveat being that if no one tries to deal for Cassell, the Patriots will keep him at that salary number for one year. They do have the option if this happens to do the whole process all over again and franchise him again next year. THere is no limit on hte number of times a player can be franchised.

The end result is the Pats have hedged their bet. If they really wanted to make sure they kept Cassell they would have opted for the Exclusive tage, which they did not. This will be interesting to watch (rumors abound about teams interested such as the Lions, Vikings, Chiefs, Bucs, etc.)….