The 2011 Collective Bargaining Agreement extended from two years to three the minimum period for extending the contracts of draft picks. Technically, the extension can be signed upon completion of a player’s third regular season.
Since then, no team has signed a player in the window between the end of his third regular season and the start of the postseason.
So here’s the question. Would the Eagles consider making such an unprecedented move in the down time between Week 18 and, if they clinch the No. 1 seed, the divisional round?
After a Week Eight win over the Steelers, Hurts told PFT that he’s not thinking about his second contract, at all. But what if the Eagles, one of the most forward-thinking teams in the league, realize the upside of giving Hurts a major contract as quickly as possible? The gesture would cement the relationship, as long as the amount offered represented fair compensation for his services.
What would or wouldn’t be fair could be tougher to determine. At one point, it appeared that perhaps the Eagles could keep Hurts on a mid-level deal, allowing them to use the extra cap space to retain great players around him, for years to come. This year, he has gotten even better; if the Eagles are indeed the No. 1 seed, he’ll likely be the MVP or the first runner-up.
Although the contract can’t be signed until after the regular season ends, it can be negotiated in the weeks leading up to it. Or the Eagles could just broach the topic the day after the regular season ends, knowing that they have some time before it’s time to focus on their divisional-round game.
The chances of it happening fall squarely on the “not likely” side of 50/50. But someone has to be the first to cash in with a major contract that the player has earned at a time when the injury risk of the looming postseason can be shifted to the team. While, on one hand, negotiations that don’t end in a contract can become a distraction, getting the contract done would remove any chance of the player being concerned that an injury during the playoffs will derail his offseason effort to get the contract he deserves.
Hurts isn’t the only player who falls into this category as the 2022 postseason approaches. The Bengals could decide to extend quarterback Joe Burrow. The Dolphins could decide to extend quarterback Tua Tagovailoa. The Chargers, if they make it to the playoffs, could decide to extend quarterback Justin Herbert.
And it’s not just quarterbacks. Justin Jefferson of the Vikings has proven to be the best young receiver in the NFL, or the best receiver in the NFL, period. Why not let him approach the playoffs with no concern whatsoever regarding whether some fluke injury during the extra games the Vikings will play could derail the payday he already has earned, and then some?
Again, chances are that none of the teams will do it, primarily because the players involved have no leverage to force it to happen. No one is going to hold out of the postseason, or even threaten to do so.
But that makes it all the more appropriate for the teams involved to consider doing right by players who have done right by the team.
Remember this -- the rookie wage scale was adopted in 2011 to prevent players who become busts from taking millions out of the system. This means that those who become stars got far less of a contract than what they deserved. For those players who are the exact opposite of busts, why not give them what they should have gotten in the first place, as soon as they are eligible to get it?
