Chris Jones - Making Him the Highest Paid Defender in the League

[dlphg9]

Why couldn't we do it? Khalil Mack, the highest paid defensive player in the league right now had cap hits of $13.8 mil in yr 1 of his new deal and $11.9 mil in yr 2. Macks avg yearly salary is $23.5 mil per year.

Veach doesn't seem to like giving guys contracts past the age of 30, so I could see him doing a 5 yr $120 mil deal. That keeps Jones in KC until age 30 and we get all his prime years and don't run the risk of having to pay him a ton of money after he's 30. Him being a 2nd rounder is going to help him in negotiating.

If we structure the contract so that his cap hit is $13 mil in year 1 and $15 mil in year 2, we have him cheap when we are tight with the cap this year and then next year there should be a decent jump in the cap and we're not out $8 mil because of Eric Berrys dead money. The cap should raise significantly for the remaining 3 years of his contract and it wont burden us with trying to get other good players.

There are several factors that should allow him to become the highest paid defender in the league.

1. He is an absolute beast. I am higher on his run D than most, but no one can argue that he is not, at worst, the 2nd best pass rushing interior lineman in the league. Personally, I put him right next to Aaron Donald when it comes to pass rushing. Now someone smarter than me correct me please, but has there ever been a better pass rusher at that position than those 2? His impact in the Super Bowl will be a big bargaining chip for him during negotiations as well

2. He is only 25 years old. Veach is smart. He doesn't like giving out big money to old guys and he's not going to extend guys into the twilight of their careers and pay them tons of money. Luckily for Chris Jones he is only 25 and a 5 year deal puts him at 30 years old. Veach wants to keep guys that still have their best years ahead of him and the prime age for a DT is 28 according to PFF, so that means in theory we haven't even seen the best Chris Jones and Brett Veach isn't going to just let that walk away.

3. The new CBA. When the top paid defenders signed their deals there were only 16 regular season game and now neverything is pointing to a 17 game regular season, so contracts are going to reflect that. Prior to the news about the newest CBA coming a year early my best guess was that CJ was going to get $21.5 mil a year from the Chiefs, since Frank Clark is basically getting $21 mil a year. $21.5 mil a year breaks down to $1.34 mil per regular season game, so that extra game should pay an additional $1.34 mil a year and that alone puts CJs yearly avg to just under $23 million a year. That hasn't even taken into account the increase in the percentage of profit the players are getting.

Chris Jones is one of my favorite players on the team and is probably my favorite player on the defense. I hope we keep him even if we have to pay him more money per year than any other defender in the history of the league. My love for Chris Jones may cloud my judgement and make me irrational and I may be completely wrong in my train of thought, but I dont think signing Jones long term is detrimental to the future success of this team whatsoever. I actually believe it would be insanely stupid and detrimental to let a generational talent like Chris Jones walk because we got some draft picks for him. Chris Jones's skills are only matched by one other player at his position and those 2 may be the best pass rushers we have ever seen at d tackle and I don't think anyone else is even close. You can't replace his production and trading him is an awful idea.

[OrtonsPiercedTaint]

Tag is 16.3, any trade partners know you're up against it

[Coogs]

Originally Posted by The Franchise

Is that including Erving’s contract? Because he’s gone as well as Sammy.

This one, Spotrac, doesn't list him. Only in the dead cap space. Over the cap still has him in, but they only have us at 6.8 million in cap space too. Not sure which one is more accurate.

[kcclone]

Originally Posted by Chris Meck

there's just no ****in' way guys.

You can't tie up $40m plus in half of your starting DL.

Agreed. It’s not happening. Not with $40+ for Mahomes staring us in the face

[Chief Roundup]

Originally Posted by Chris Meck

there's just no ****in' way guys.

You can't tie up $40m plus in half of your starting DL.

Well maybe we can give him a couple of 96 roll packages of toilet paper to reduce his number.

[BlackOp]

The new CBA allots a 1.5 million cap exemption per veteran player with over 4 years on KC's roster.

This, in theory, gives the Chiefs $12 mil in relief...Jones just completed year 4.

[Warrior5]

Originally Posted by Red Dawg

Have we even tagged Jones yet?

You didn't ask this question in official CP format.

[ShowtimeSBMVP]

No surprise, but Chiefs are placing franchise tag on DT Chris Jones today, per source.

— Adam Schefter (@AdamSchefter) March 16, 2020

[cwhocares]

Jones tagged.

https://lastwordonprofootball.com/20...gc4oq25OvKyMsw

[KChiefs1]

Assessing the Chiefs' options with Chris Jones following the Colts' trade for DeForest Buckner

By Eric Eager

We’re into the second week of free agency, and for the defending Super Bowl champion Kansas City Chiefs, it’s been a quiet ride. Gone are starters Kendall Fuller and Stefen Wisniewski, and in are Mike Remmers and former XFL star Jordan Ta’amu. Sammy Watkins and his big ($21 million) cap number remain on the roster, while the Chiefs' ability to do much else is hampered substantially by having under $400,000 in cap space per our friends at OverTheCap.

The elephant in the room, as it has been since the end of the season, is star interior lineman Chris Jones, the fourth-most valuable defensive tackle in the NFL since he entered the league as a second-round pick in 2016. As we wrote about last month, the Chiefs were a bit hamstrung with options for retaining Jones prior to when free agency started, as he was reportedly commanding Aaron Donald ($22.5 million APY) money and a long-term deal. The Chiefs already invested two draft picks and a five-year, $105.7 million last offseason into edge player Frank Clark, further complicating matters.

As such, Kansas City applied the franchise tag to Jones ($16.1 million) and were likely trying to trade him to a defense-needy team for a draft pick in the late first round or early second round. Such designs were thwarted a bit early last week, when the Indianapolis Colts traded the 13th-overall pick to the San Francisco 49ers for DeForest Buckner and then promptly gave him a deal worth $84 million over four years. Where it matters most, Jones is a better player than Buckner, putting up five more pressures on more than 300 fewer pass-rushing snaps than the former Oregon Duck, while playing on a far less-talented defensive line. Thus, a reasonable valuation of Jones would be $21 million APY and a top-15 pick after this move, neither of which is likely to be realized. So what should they do?

IGNORE THE COLTS' DEAL FOR BUCKNER

Markets tend toward efficiency, but the market for NFL players is a) not stationary, b) not big and c) not necessarily made up of completely rational actors. While we like the overall direction of the Colts under Chris Ballard, the Buckner deal was an overpay both in terms of draft-pick compensation and contract. George Chahrouri and I left all interior defenders off our analytics mock, and for good reason: Interior players do not provide the value play-for-play that mirrors even edge players, and coverage is more valuable than the play of both. The same applies to handing out big contracts to interior players: don’t do it.

SUBSCRIBE TO PFF.

[BossChief]

With Chris being on the non exclusive tag and the Colts moving a high pick and big cap space for Buckner, Jones agent can argue much. He can’t say “the fact a team has to give up a big pick along with a contract makes getting a fair deal done impossible” because Buckner was traded for a premium pick and a huge deal.

Chris is obviously finding out what his true value is.

Hopefully that leads to a big extension that he deserves.

[The Franchise]

NFL.com listed his projected contract as 5 years and $101.5 million.

[BossChief]

Something I know for sure is Mahomes contacted Sammy and Chris and is willing to do a Mahometown discount to keep both in KC. The part that’s taking so long is the structure of all 3 deals so there is cap flexibility in the future and finding deals that satisfy all 3.

If all 3 are reasonable, I expect all 3 deals to be announced within a week of each other.

The hang up is possibly the upcoming TV deals due to the coronavirus complicating the amount the deals are negotiated for in many ways.

[BossChief]

Originally Posted by The Franchise

NFL.com listed his projected contract as 5 years and $101.5 million.

Everybody looks at the reported amount of the Aaron Donald deal and not the whole deal. The total years Donald signed for was 7, not 6.

The total reported amount is 6/135 to make it look huge, but he actually signed a total deal of 7/142.

If he’d sign it, I’d give him that deal immediately

[Chief Northman]

Originally Posted by BossChief

Something I know for sure is Mahomes contacted Sammy and Chris and is willing to do a Mahometown discount to keep both in KC. The part that’s taking so long is the structure of all 3 deals so there is cap flexibility in the future and finding deals that satisfy all 3.

If all 3 are reasonable, I expect all 3 deals to be announced within a week of each other.

The hang up is possibly the upcoming TV deals due to the coronavirus complicating the amount the deals are negotiated for in many ways.

Mahomes won’t get done until next year.

[BossChief]

Originally Posted by Chief Northman

Mahomes won’t get done until next year.

He might sign an EXTENSION this year to his existing contract once the 5th year option is exercised.