Exclusive or Non-Exclusive Franchise Tag for Flacco?

**wickedsolo** · 02-20-2013, 11:16 AM

Originally Posted by Paintballguy

Did people forget the Giants game where McKinnie wasn't playing, but Flacco still lit up the Giants?

:word

Was just about to say this.

**pslholder96** · 02-20-2013, 11:17 AM

Originally Posted by wickedsolo

Speculative at best.

What other doom-n-gloom scenarios do you see in that crystal ball of yours?

The reason I say that is because there is 1 specific piece that you're missing in all of this: NO CAM.

:respect...there are a lot of pieces missing in the OP's arguement.

**Bazooka Joe** · 02-20-2013, 11:25 AM

Neither! A deal will be done. Both sides are motivated and most of the work on this deal has already been done last year. So Flacco gets his 7/130. 30m bonus.

**Maelstrom** · 02-20-2013, 11:30 AM

Originally Posted by chicagoravensfan

Flacco with the 2012/13 playoff offensive line + Boldin in beast-mode is a franchise QB.

Flacco eating up 1/6 of the cap with Oher and Jah Reid as starting tackles and Tandon Doss as #2 WR is a disaster.

Hyperbole.

**Maelstrom** · 02-20-2013, 11:41 AM

Furthermore, without Cam, Flacco is poised to carry this team back to the playoffs and lock up home field advantage. The Ravens still have enough talent in place in all three phases of the game, and Ozzie is good enough, smart enough, and gosh darn it, people like him. Oz will pick up value FAs and a couple of undrafted rookies, plus have another good/great draft. This is the way this team and front office operate year in and year out. It is just how it works, and thank goodness it works this way.

What happens in the playoffs is anyone's guess, because you just never know. But you can take Flacco as a top QB who can put the team on his back to the bank. And Joe will be escorting the team there (the bank and the playoffs) and have a new contract signed right before the deadline, and not any earlier.

**Ravens75** · 02-20-2013, 11:54 AM

The players you mentioned were non QB's.

QB's are treated differently. Look at what the Slurs gave up to get RG III who was unproven.

Flacco is a SB MVP that's proven to be good and sometimes great in the reg. season. If I am the Browns with the cap room a good offensive line and a defense I give up the 2 1st rounders plus the $100 mil contract for a guy that could eventually take them to the SB. In addition they would still have enough cap room to add a Mike Wallace which could make that offense top 5.

The Ravens have no choice but to give Joe the exclusive tender.

**GOTA** · 02-20-2013, 11:56 AM

Originally Posted by Ravens75

The players you mentioned were non QB's.

QB's are treated differently. Look at what the Slurs gave up to get RG III who was unproven.

Flacco is a SB MVP that's proven to be good and sometimes great in the reg. season. If I am the Browns with the cap room a good offensive line and a defense I give up the 2 1st rounders plus the $100 mil contract for a guy that could eventually take them to the SB. In addition they would still have enough cap room to add a Mike Wallace which could make that offense top 5.

The Ravens have no choice but to give Joe the exclusive tender.

Exactly. The Browns either get the franchise QB they've been trying to find for decades or stick the Ravens with a contract that screws up the season. It's win/win for them. That's why the Ravens can't let them even get a chance at Flacco.

**lovefootball** · 02-20-2013, 11:57 AM

Originally Posted by chicagoravensfan

Kicked off by Tony's article (http://russellstreetreport.com/non-e...g-with-flacco/), I had a few more thoughts on why the Ravens should use the non-exclusive tag.

Last year there were countless stories about how some team was going to swoop in on Mike Wallace or Lardarius Webb to steal them away from cap-strapped teams. Never happened. In Mike Wallace's case, the cost was only 1 first-rounder and the team would have only had to better the $2.5 million RFA tender price. In order to steal Flacco from the Ravens, the team would have to:

1) give up 2 first round picks
2) structure the contract such that the Ravens couldn't match. That would have to be something in the magnitude of $60 million guaranteed to make the year 1 salary cap hit in the $25 million range
3) convince Flacco that it's worth leaving a great situation. Would he really leave a model franchise to get destroyed behind the Arizona offensive line for an extra $10 million?

As awesome as Flacco's post-season run is, the guy is not on the Brees/Rodgers/Peyton/Brady level where he can turn a crap team into a Super Bowl contender. With a good o-line and good weapons he can go all the way, but without the right supporting cast we get games like last year's against Jacksonville or this year against Kansas City, Houston or Denver.

I also suspect there is a good deal of collusion around RFA's (especially under the new CBA which does not allow poison pills). Owners don't mess with other teams RFA's so that their's don't get messed with.

Right player - right price. If the cost of the exclusive franchise tag is losing Ellerbe, Boldin, Jacoby and/or a starting caliber LT, it is too steep a price.

Are you related to p king or are you p king. Flacco's here to stay and anyone thinking the Ravens won't do whatever it takes to keep him needs help. Ravens new leader is Joe Flacco and the Ravens will be geared up every year to play in post season. Play quiet with a big arm will be Flaccos theme and other teams will see him for a while setting more records . Peter king and other talking heads have looked bad in their predictions about the Ravens and Flacco. Lot of talking heads had to eat Raven after winning the SB.

**Purpleguy** · 02-20-2013, 12:14 PM

You also have to remember that letting Flacco go would be a mistake of "curse of the Bambino" type proportions. The Ravens have to keep this guy. They have nobody else to put in there. Tyrod Taylor is not an NFL QB, and nobody wants to start the QB carousel again. We don't have the dominant defense to sustain it anymore. Of course Flacco and his agent know this, and like anyone else, they're going to take advantage of the situation. This is what the Ravens get for not getting the deal done last season, or better yet, the season before last. If our FO has one major flaw, it's waiting until the last minute to get guys resigned and then paying full price or more. It happens all the time. They did lock Rice up early, but they still overpaid. They should have been focusing on Flacco then. RBs practically grow on trees in this league. Franchise QBs come along once every seventeen years.

**The Excellector** · 02-20-2013, 04:32 PM

Originally Posted by chicagoravensfan

Kicked off by Tony's article (http://russellstreetreport.com/non-e...g-with-flacco/), I had a few more thoughts on why the Ravens should use the non-exclusive tag.

Last year there were countless stories about how some team was going to swoop in on Mike Wallace or Lardarius Webb to steal them away from cap-strapped teams. Never happened. In Mike Wallace's case, the cost was only 1 first-rounder and the team would have only had to better the $2.5 million RFA tender price. In order to steal Flacco from the Ravens, the team would have to:

1) give up 2 first round picks
2) structure the contract such that the Ravens couldn't match. That would have to be something in the magnitude of $60 million guaranteed to make the year 1 salary cap hit in the $25 million range
3) convince Flacco that it's worth leaving a great situation. Would he really leave a model franchise to get destroyed behind the Arizona offensive line for an extra $10 million?

As awesome as Flacco's post-season run is, the guy is not on the Brees/Rodgers/Peyton/Brady level where he can turn a crap team into a Super Bowl contender. With a good o-line and good weapons he can go all the way, but without the right supporting cast we get games like last year's against Jacksonville or this year against Kansas City, Houston or Denver.

I also suspect there is a good deal of collusion around RFA's (especially under the new CBA which does not allow poison pills). Owners don't mess with other teams RFA's so that their's don't get messed with.

Right player - right price. If the cost of the exclusive franchise tag is losing Ellerbe, Boldin, Jacoby and/or a starting caliber LT, it is too steep a price.

Let's take this one step at a time. First, it might be unwise to compare a WR or CB to a Super Bowl MVP QB. Second, teams have given up two first round picks for lesser talent/unproven talent. Third, look at how long it took the Ravens to start building the offense around Flacco and not around this 'Run the ball, rely on the defense' philosophy. It wasn't until then, basically after Cam got fired, that the team went on this run, with Joe leading the way. I would challenge you (in a friendly way) to explain how Drew Brees, Peyton Manning, Tom Brady or Aaron Rodgers has taken a team with lesser talent than the 2012 Ravens, and won the Super Bowl.

Personally, from my perspective, none of them have done it. Brady's defenses were some of the best in the league the year he won the Super Bowl and his offensive lines have always been superb. Once their defense weakened, they still made the playoffs, but they don't have any rings to show for it. The one year that Indianapolis won the Super Bowl, Peyton Manning had a poor individual postseason. He threw three interceptions against Kansas City, two against Baltimore and didn't even score a single TD in that game. Their defense stepped up big time with that pass rush and Tampa 2 scheme. Drew Brees had the best Guard tandem in the league, and often had a clean pocket to step up into. Aaron Rodgers had a pretty good defense of his own, along with Greg Jennings and Donald Driver.

Next, there's nothing to say that the team signing Flacco won't be able to build around him. Lastly, even at a favorable price for the organization, those guys that you mentioned are still at risk. Even if Flacco signs for a few million per year less than what he could get from them, it doesn't change that Jacoby Jones' cap number is 4.9, which is a lot for a returner/third WR. Leach's number is sizable as well. That few million won't change the fact that some of these guys are gone.

**The Excellector** · 02-20-2013, 04:33 PM

Originally Posted by pslholder96

And the cost of losing a franchise type QB we've been looking for all these years is not steeper??

That too.

**Coastergenius** · 02-20-2013, 06:27 PM

I think that what people fail to realize about the Browns is that they wouldn't just have to top our offer, they would have to crush our offer. Who in their right minds would walk away from a Super Bowl team with potential Pro Bowlers at every offensive position to get crushed on a weekly basis, and not sniff the play-offs from an extra million or two ayear. I'd say that it would have be $25-26 million per year for Flacco to think about it. Would a team be willing to pay that much and give up 2 first rounders?