Aaron Rodgers is the new leader of contract negotiations in the NFL. He is in a unique position to help the NFL become a much stronger league for the players. Rodgers could easily go to the Packers and ask them for a fully Guaranteed contract, and they would be in a position where they would have to pay him. I want to see him make this decision, and I want to see how fast the Packers will jump to comply.
Why does he need guarantees?
The biggest contracts in the NFL have major guarantees built into them, but a fully guaranteed contract is not typical.
The NFL does not have guaranteed contracts in their CBA, and they do not see them given out ever. No one has had the guts to ask for and receive the contract that I think Rodgers can receive. I believe that we can safely assume that it only takes one guy asking the question to get the results that all the players want. Other players could have asked for a deal such as this, but they would have been run out of the room.
Who else could ask?
Tom Brady could ask the Patriots for that kind of money, and Matthew Stanford could have asked the Lions for that kind of money. I could see Matt Ryan asking the Falcons for a full guarantee, and I could see Cam Newton doing the same in Carolina. There are people who could ask for that money, but Aaron Rodgers is more valuable to his team than all those people.
Yes, I said it, Bill Belichick is more valuable than Tom Brady.
What would happen?
Everyone would ask for a full guarantee, and many of those players would get them. Why? Because somebody would give them the money. Fans would be screaming for owners to pay these players because the owners are richer than God. Do we really think Jerry Jones does not have the money to give Dez Bryant a full guarantee?
He does, and he would have to pay because another team would do it in his place. It only takes one player to make a change before the whole league is thrown into a frenzy having to pay their players way more than they were getting in the past.
It will hasten a lockout
The owners would want to have a lockout simply because they got upset about the guaranteed money, and they would try to legislate it in the CBA.
You see, I think that the NFL will be locked out either way because I do not trust the owners and the players to get along. Roger Goodall and DeMaurice Smith like arguing too much, and they make it seem like there is too much animosity to have a normal conversation. That plus the potential of full guarantees spells trouble.
