Tonight's RFA deadline is looming
National Football League
Draft King Analysis
June 14, 2010
Lou Pickney, DraftKing.com
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It appears as if the Big XII won't be losing Texas & friends to the Pac-10, with the latest rumor being that Air Force and BYU would be imported to replace Colorado (heading to the Pac-10 in 2012) and Nebraska (heading to the Big Ten in 2013). It's unclear how the staggered timeline would work, or how much validity to put into the rumors at this point.
Air Force and BYU were charter members of the Mountain West conference, and losing them to a revamped Big XII would be a tough blow for a conference that just agreed to bring Boise State into its ranks in 2011. Moreover, the Mountain West could potentially lose Utah to the Pac-10 (which needs a 12th team to be able to have a conference championship game as per NCAA rules) if Texas and friends don't bolt from the Big XII to the Pac-10.
It's all quite confusing to the casual fan, though things will work themselves out (as they usually do) once the major players make their decisions. For all the talk of Texas A&M jumping to the SEC, I wonder if at least some of that talk by A&M was posturing to avoid the perception that they are somehow handcuffed to what the University of Texas decides.
A&M would have needed another team to make the jump to the SEC so as to avoid giving the conference an odd number of teams, but all indications are that the SEC wasn't going to look at the likes of Georgia Tech (a former SEC school), Miami, Florida State, or Clemson to potentially balance it out on the east side.
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Shawne Merriman turned 26 last month. (Icon SMI)
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The SEC already has a strong presence in Georgia, South Carolina, and Florida, and adding another school in one of those states wouldn't have the same economic impact as adding one (or two) from new states. Modern expansion of the major conferences is directly tied to television money, which in turn is tied to tangibles like the size of new markets that could be added via expansion. Overall, the fewer teams that move, the better in my opinion, though at this point any number of scenarios seem both possible and plausible.
There is a deadline looming at midnight tonight for 15 restricted free agents who have not yet signed their tender offers. As part of the final year of the CBA, a player who would have normally been eligible for unrestricted free agency after four (or five) years now is instead a restricted free agent. This has infuriated players like Shawne Merriman (one of the 15 facing the midnight deadline), but it's something that is outside of their control.
This gets a bit complicated, and this article on nfl.com explains the situation probably better than I could. Here is an excerpt from the article:
"RFAs can still sign the original March tender offer (which was extended again on June 1) until 11:59 PM ET tonight. If the RFA does not sign by 11:59 PM ET tonight, the club may substitute a new June 15th tender of 110 percent of the RFA's 2009 base salary."
Below is a list of the players and teams affected by this deadline.
Green Bay Packers: DB Atari Bigby, DE Johnny Jolly, CB Tramon Williams
Kansas City Chiefs: DB Jarrad Page
Miami Dolphins: RB Ronnie Brown
New England Patriots: Logan Mankins
New Orleans Saints: OT Jamaal Brown, DB Roman Harper, WR Lance Moore, RB Pierre Thomas
San Diego Chargers: WR Vincent Jackson, OT Marcus McNeill, OLB Shawne Merriman
Tampa Bay Buccaneers: OT Donald Penn
Washington Redskins: CB Carlos Rogers
While most (if not all) of these players will end up being on the opening day rosters of the team that presently holds their rights, this situation could potentially create bad blood between the player in question and his current team. That even holds true for the Saints, who are coming off of a Super Bowl win but who have four players on the list. As this article explains, Roman Harper and Pierre Thomas in particular could lose a large deal of money if the Saints lower their tender offers after the midnight deadline.
