Is the fifth-year option still a viable option for team building?

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1:54Robert Mays: Welcome to the Athletic Football Show. I'm Robert Mays. Today, we're digging into fifth-year options for the 2023 draft class. The deadline was last week, but there were some notable decisions that were made around this year's fifth-year option crop, especially a guy like Jack Campbell. The Lions decided not to pick up his option despite him being an All-Pro last year. We know the reasons for that. Linebackers are lumped in with edge rushers. It pumps up the value of that position, makes a team like the Lions a little bit more hesitant to pick up that option, similar to what happened with Tyler Linderbaum last year.

2:26Robert Mays: So we wanted to use the Jack Campbell news and that conversation just as an entry point into the 2023 class and what it tells us about fifth-year options in general. There are half a dozen, even more players in this group that I think are notable touch points that allow us to just discuss where the fifth-year option practice is in the NFL, period. So that's what me and Dave did today. We looked at the 2023 draft, the choices the teams made around these 50-year options, and what it can tell us about the state of the 50-year option considerations and discussions in the NFL right now. So let's get to it right now.

3:14Robert Mays: we're a few days late on this but we were talking about we're talking last week about some of the things we wanted to dig into now that we were in the offseason and the fifth year option deadline was late last week for players taken in the 2023 draft and there were some decisions associated with those first round picks, Dave, that led to an extended conversation, Jack Campbell being the best example of those. And so we are now 15 years in since the 2011 draft class and that first draft class from the newly revamped CBA that had the fifth year options. Obviously, there have been some changes in how the fifth year options are exercised.

3:50Robert Mays: We'll dig into on this show, but we have 15 years since that CBA came to be. And so I wanted to kind of take a step back now that the 2023 class has sorted itself out from the fifth year option standpoint and just look at where we're at with fifth year options through the lens of this group of 32 players. So that's what we're going to do today. We're going to take a little bit of time to look at the 2023 class and some of the decisions associated with that and the values associated with those fifth year options. Just to kind of talk about the state of the fifth year option as we're a decade and a half or so into this version of the NFL.

4:27Derrik Klassen: real life usually produces or inspires the best content and when the detroit lions opted not to pick up jack campbell's option i spent the rest of the day thinking about like about that like okay i understand the finances of this but why and how did we get here is that the right call what does it mean for the future and after daydreaming about it for a couple hours i was like you know this probably make a pretty good podcast episode so here we are

4:56Robert Mays: just quick things before we dig into this class in general. I just wanted to lay out like some basic information about the fifth year options and the way that they currently operate after the change in the 2020 CBA that tweaked some of the rules. So in the previous iteration of the CBA, starting in like the 2011 range, all the way up through 2020, the fifth year options were broken down into two specific categories. They were either four players picked in the top 10 or players pick 11 to 32. For the players picked in the top 10, if your fifth year option, the number associated with your fifth year option was the transition tag of the position that you play.

5:34Robert Mays: If you were picked in the top 10, independent of whatever you had done as a player up to that point. If you were picked from 11 to 32, your fifth year option was the average salaries from players three through 25 at your position over the last five years. So it really didn't matter what sort of player you were. It was almost all based on draft slot. And the other very important consideration is that the fifth-year options under the old way of doing things were guaranteed only for injury. Now, with the 2020 update, the two big key changes are, one, these things are now fully guaranteed the moment that they're picked up.

6:11Robert Mays: And I think that has changed some thinking from teams, but not as much as you might think, which we can get into. And then obviously the other huge change is that instead of having two designations based on draft slot, either 1 through 10 or 11 through 32, we now have four different designations and they have nothing to do with draft slot whatsoever. So the four different designations are now your basic designation, which that means you don't hit the playtime requirements necessary to kind of bump you up a notch. And that is the average of the third to 25th highest salaries at your position over the past five years.

6:46Robert Mays: There is a playtime designation, which is 75 % or greater in two of their first three seasons, an average of 75 % or greater in all three seasons, or 50 % or greater over all three seasons. For those players, it's the third through 20th highest salaries at their positions over the last five years. If you make one Pro Bowl, you go and get the transition tender. It's the same as it would have been for picks one through 10 under the previous system. If you make multiple Pro Bowls, you are now eligible for the franchise tag tender for your fifth year option. So we went from two different designations in the prior system to four with these salaries now being fully guaranteed.

7:25Robert Mays: So that is the world in which we are now operating with the fifth year options. I just wanted to establish that at the beginning in case there are people who are not super familiar with what the system looks like now.

7:37Derrik Klassen: And I think that's worth spelling out. I mean, I know we've been under this new CBA for a while at this point, but I don't know. I think the fifth year option got baked into the collective consciousness as a pretty simple yes, no. Like, is this guy playing well enough to pick up the option? Is he not? And in the old format, you didn't really have to think that hard about it. Like, by the time you get through three years of the rookie deal, you've got a pretty good idea of whether he's worth pulling that lever and picking up the option. But this new format, I mean, what you just laid out is why Tyler Linderbaum is not still a Baltimore Raven, because by playing well enough to make multiple Pro Bowls, you up the ante to the point where Tyler Linderbaum is a player who's worth whatever it was,$26 million.

8:27Derrik Klassen: And all of a sudden, it's a much different conversation for a center than it used to be. And Jack Campbell going through something similar this year, which was one of the inspirations for this show. So I do think it's worth laying out that the considerations have changed pretty heavily here over the last, whatever it is, five years.

8:44Robert Mays: It's funny. I was talking to somebody earlier today with a team just talking about kind of how things have changed with the fifth year options over the two different sorts of systems. And we'll talk about why this is the case. But in this current iteration, you would assume that teams are picking up the fifth year options less often because they are more player friendly. Again, coming from two different directions, the fact that they're now guaranteed for the fifth year and these numbers are getting higher potentially because there are these incentives and some of these levers that players can hit if they perform at a certain level.

9:17Robert Mays: But they haven't actually gone down in any substantial way because there are a bunch of other factors that are pulling it in a different direction, especially with a couple of these other positions. the explosion with some of the veteran salaries has made it so even if you have a player that like you just said maybe under the old way of thinking whether it was a yes or no like i don't really know if this guy's somebody we want to pick up his fifth year option now like the guy out there out is like lucas van ness right like lucas van ness has not been some gangbusters hit for the packers but lucas van ness's fifth year option is 13.8 million dollars on that basic level well Well, the top of the edge market now is$50 million.

10:00Robert Mays: So even if Lucas Van Ness has not been like a star for the Packers, if you're paying edge 20 money for a guy on his fifth year option, it starts to become more and more in your favor, even if that guy hasn't necessarily been a rousing success. And so there should be a lot of reasons based on the new system for guys not getting their options picked up, but certain explosions in money have led to us to a place where it actually does make sense for these guys to get paid at this level.

10:31Derrik Klassen: 22 players in this current crop that just had the deadline had their options picked up, which is a really high number in 2022. It was 19 in 2021. It was 18. I shouldn't say in 2022, I should say for the 2022 class for those classes it was 1918 for the 2021 class for the 2020 class it was all the way down at 12 and so when i see that 22 guys had their options picked up and of course there's going to be some weird situations and that's why i think this is worth talking about but i see that 22 guys have their options picked up and i'm like well yes the cap and therefore veteran salaries are exploding right now.

11:13Derrik Klassen: So paying guys a median or an average salary for being even decent players, I don't think it's as scary a proposition in most circumstances. But the weird situations where things get twisted up is why I think this is a fun conversation.

11:29Robert Mays: We'll dig into some of the examples of guys that, again, got paid at a reasonable level and why you would pick it up. The irony with that 22 of 32 number is one of the better players in this class didn't get his option picked up because of the weird positional stuff. So let's dig into the Jack Campbell part of this first. We're just going to go through our plan today is to go through like seven or eight different players in this class and kind of talk about the way that the consideration around their options speaks to some of the larger environmental factors at play. So let's start with Jack Campbell.

12:03Robert Mays: That was the most interesting thing to you. That's kind of why we wanted to do this. So as you were parsing the Lions' decision not to pick up Jack Campbell's option and kind of what that says about the way that we designate players and some of the choices the teams are having to make, what came to mind for you?

12:19Derrik Klassen: I mean, it's pretty simple math once you get over the shock of a guy who was just all pro not getting his option picked up. But the one Pro Bowl designation for a linebacker in this format is that he's going to make$22 million in salary fully guaranteed for the fifth year of his contract. If Jack Campbell had been good enough to be a two Pro Bowl player, you're talking about$27 million. So it's pretty simple accounting why you might not want to do that. Like why you might not want to leapfrog Jack Campbell multiple million dollars over Fred Warner in the linebacker hierarchy for one good year.

12:57Derrik Klassen: I just think it kind of sucks because as much consideration goes into this and as much money is involved, it's kind of weird that linebackers and edge rushers are co-mingled into this weird world where off -ball linebackers have three and off-ball like traditional linebackers and three, four edge rusher linebackers are kind of linked together in this nebulous world where those guys' salaries are going to develop and the edge rushers are going to live in the world. to affect Jack Campbell. And so I don't blame the Lions if they're like, hey, hey, hey, hey, this is not a guy who's going to get 12 sacks for us.

13:35Derrik Klassen: What are we doing here? And I guess it's very interesting because this is a very good thing for Jack Campbell. Yes. That like that his floor can be set so highly, but it's also not reflective of what you are really paying him to do. And that's the interesting thing to me is, OK, the players probably want this. At the end of the day, Jack Campbell and his representation probably want his salary to be so inflated. But if you wind up in a spot where you do a great job drafting an off-ball linebacker, and the result is that it's untenable to keep him for a fifth year, how does that affect the position in the long term?

14:16Derrik Klassen: I'm very interested in that. And it's very interesting to me that the Lions nailed this pick that they got heavily criticized for making. and the result is that they don't want to pick up his option. Like, that's strange that we wound up in this place, but it makes sense because of these weird designation rules. Building on what you said, to be very clear,

14:36Robert Mays: this is very good for the players, right? If you're Jack Campbell, this is a very good situation. So I think there are some people who might look at this and be like, man, he got his$22 million option decline. Like, that's a tough outcome for a player. Well, no, he gets to be a free agent one year faster than he would have been otherwise. So like just for a practical example, he would add$22 million guaranteed on his 2027 salary if this option had been picked up. Well, now he's going to be a free agent heading into next offseason. Just for the very quick like market comparison, Aziz Alshire just got three years and$54 million.

15:12Robert Mays: So even if Jack Campbell doesn't reset the linebacker market, if you're winding up somewhere near like the top three to five, Aziz Alshire got$38 million guaranteed on that deal. And so this accelerates Jack Campbell to almost twice as much money guaranteed on his second contract than he would have gotten on that single 50 or option. And the other part of this that I think is good for both off-ball linebackers and the other position we'll talk about is interior offensive linemen, because a lot of what we're talking about here applies to the thinking around Tyler Linderbaum and what the Ravens had to do, is that for the same reasons that teams aren't going to pick up the fifth-year option because it's lumped in with positions that have nothing to do with what you're playing every day for your team, it's the same reason you're not going to get franchise tagged, because it's the same thought process.

15:59Robert Mays: The same numbers go into it. So now you have two different areas where teams have less control over off-ball linebackers and interior offensive linemen specifically. And that leads to the question that you just asked. Is that going to mean that more teams don't want to use first-round picks on off-ball linebackers and interior offensive linemen because that extra year of control that should come along with that first-round pick? Not only do you not get that one, but you don't even have the franchise tag to give

16:28Derrik Klassen: yourself the sixth year of control which i'm i'm struggling to reconcile my desire to be pro player with the fact that this seems like a pretty big market inefficiency for teams right like if and we'll just keep using jack campbell as an example but if you are not a full-time pass rusher to be linked to guys that rush the passer for their full-time job. I don't blame teams if that's really frustrating. I don't want to take that potential earning power away from players, but this does seem like something that would be nice to correct, and I think that goes for it. So, I mean, the big two, actually, there's really three, and the designations for how they decide these things, they seem very arbitrary to me.

17:20Derrik Klassen: We already mentioned off-ball linebackers and three, four pass rushing linebackers affect each other. All offensive linemen are classified together. That's how we wind up with the Linderbaum thing, where a center is having his salary affected by what tackles are getting paid and guards for that matter. And then the other one, Robert, which you made sure to mention when we were prepping for this. if you're an interior defensive lineman the front that your team runs in the scheme that your team runs can determine if you're classified as an end or a true defensive tackle which can put a cap on your earning potential like all of this stuff for better or for worse from the player's perspective just seems like it would be less confusing if we could streamline it a little bit

18:04Robert Mays: one that's weirdest to me is there are two different interior defensive line designations one for defensive end and one for defensive tackle. The numbers aren't that different with either of them, where I think it's going to really change the decisions that a team is going to make. It's very different than the linebacker thing that we're talking about. Like if a lot, if Kalijah can't see is make like, so the difference that I would, I noticed that the one is this feels the weirdest to me is that Kalijah can see and Jalen Carter have different designations. They are both according to over the cap.

18:39Robert Mays: They are both interior defensive linemen. but Jalen Carter is designated as a defensive tackle and Kalajah Kansi is designated as a defensive end. At the end of the day, let's just say the, for the one pro bowl designation, it's a difference of a million dollars. And so that's not going to change what a team does when it comes to their final decision. I just think it seems so incredibly arbitrary as to why there are two different designations with these players. I don't, it doesn't totally make sense to me.

19:05Derrik Klassen: I promise you, if it was my million dollars, it would piss me off. And, and Kalajah Kansi, Kalaja Kansi didn't qualify for the Pro Bowl designation anyway, but just the fact that that exists, it would definitely frustrate me if I was a player, for sure.

19:21Robert Mays: So we're looking at just the linebackers and edge players. I think that the comparison I was making, and you and I were talking about this earlier, if you look all the way back at, like, let's just say the basic designation. So if you don't hit playtime incentives, and that's what Lucas Van Ness is playing on. So a Lucas Van Ness compared to like Jack Campbell on that same designation that they're they're on the same one. Right. Because they're both linebackers when it comes to this thing. So but Lucas Van Ness is obviously a front player. Jack Campbell is an off ball linebacker. So on the basic designation, you'd be paying Lucas Van Ness.

19:55Robert Mays: Packers are like Curtis Granderson gets paid. It's 13 million dollars. Carl Granderson.

20:01Derrik Klassen: Curtis Granderson was an awesome baseball player. Correct.

20:04Robert Mays: You'd be paying Carl Granderson money for Lucas Van Ness,$13 million. If you picked up Jack Campbell's option as an off-ball linebacker, you would immediately be paying him like Devin Lloyd, who is a prized free agent in this class. Like those are the differences that we're talking about here, even on the basic designation when it comes to off ball linebackers and front players designated as linebackers. So it's a massive, massive difference. And that's why for a guy like Lucas Van Ness, it's an automatic yes. And for Jack Campbell, even at the 13 million, let alone the 22 million, do the Lions have a decision to make?

20:39Derrik Klassen: that's if Jack Campbell was just a pretty good player and the Lions were confident that they wanted him on their team but he had never been a real difference maker for them at the basic tag for a fifth year option you're still talking about a top 10 off-ball linebacker salary and for Lucas Van Ness you're like holy shit this is yeah this is a great deal for a guy that's even just a piece of the rotation. So positional value, it goes without saying it's a big part of it. And for the most part, I think it works out pretty well. But yeah, you're going to have situations like this where, I don't know, I'm torn between thinking this works against Jack Campbell, but also maybe it works really in his favor, especially if he makes it to free agency.

21:27I wonder if the Lions are going to be able to keep that from happening

21:30Derrik Klassen: before the season even starts. But what's that number going to look like?

21:33Robert Mays: but you're in the Linderbaum situation if you're Jack Campbell, where if you want to hit free agency, you can. Because one of the reasons that sought-after players don't end up becoming free agents when they're under team control is that for the most part, if you're a top-of-the-market player, the team can always just tag you. We'll talk about that with a couple other players a little bit later here. The wide receiver tag right now, is it a crazy number? Like George Pickens got tagged this year for$27 million. The Zay Flowers on his fifth year option is making a wide receiver franchise tag because he made multiple Pro Bowls.

22:09Robert Mays: The wide receiver tag in 2026 makes you wide receiver 15 in AAV. That's crazy. Like that is that's that's crazy. And so that for most positions, teams can just pull that lever if they don't want a guy to hit free agency. Jack Campbell's in the same situation that Linderbaum is likely. It's like, well, yeah, in theory, like, I can negotiate early and I can get this sewn up before I get hurt or whatever, but if he wants to take this all the way to the market, there's really nothing the Lions can do about it because they're probably not going to give him a franchise tag that pays him$27 million next year.

22:47Derrik Klassen: Zay Flowers' contract on the fifth-year option, not right now, because remember, we're still a year ahead of time. These guys are entering year four of their rookie deals, but Zay Flowers next year will account for 9 % of the Ravens' salary cap. I don't think I feel great about that. Is that okay?

23:10Robert Mays: $27 million, again, but it's wide receiver 15. And so should Zay Flowers get paid like wide receiver 15? And then what's the alternative? The alternative is that you decline the option, and then you have to tag him anyway, which I guess is something the Ravens could have done. but then you don't have the franchise tag to use if you actually want to use it somewhere else.

23:31Derrik Klassen: Yeah, I think in a lot of these cases, you just have to count on the cap continuing to be your friend, which for several years it has been for teams. So that feels like a high price tag for what I've gotten out of Zay Flowers to this point in his career.

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27:37Robert Mays: let's keep going through some of these other players here the other guy the next guy you wanted to mention is peter skaronsky because i think some of these designations might have changed the decision that the titans have been willing to make about peter skaronsky and his options so what about skaronsky made you want to include him in this i just wanted to look at other

27:53Derrik Klassen: interior offensive linemen after what happened with tyler linderbaum and to be clear center is different from guard. We talked about it heading into free agency. The guard market is a little more lucrative. Top guards are making 23, 24 million dollars right now, whereas it was a little bit below that before Linderbaum blew the roof off of the center market. But I wanted to look at an interior player and how that affects negotiations because those tackle salaries, you know, those big, big numbers influence everything. And I just I think it's interesting. Again, it goes back to what you were saying a minute ago about a guy like Lucas Van Ness.

28:30Derrik Klassen: Peter Skaranski had his option picked up. I doubt the Titans thought hard about it at all because for where they got him on the tier they got him on, it's$19 million for his fifth-year salary. That is the 11th highest guard salary among players that have deals right now. That is not remotely bothersome to me. Now, if Peter Skaransky had been on the two Pro Bowl tier, like if he had been at a higher level, like, say, a Tyler Linderbaum, the tag for him is$25.7 million, which would make him the seventh highest paid offensive tackle in the NFL. Like if Peter Skaronsky had reached that level of designation, he would be resetting the current guard market by almost$2 million a year.

29:19Derrik Klassen: It's nowhere near the type of leap that a guy like Tyler Linderbaum would have made. But I do wonder if that would have given the Titans pause when it comes to picking up that option. Right now, absolute no-brainer. You do that every single time. But you're not that far removed from having to make a much more difficult decision. And I get it is it is very friendly to the players. And and that's that's that's good for them in a world where everything is slanted against them. That's a win. But I still can't help but think from the team building aspect of this where it's like, well, why do tax tackle salaries influence what I'm paying a guard?

30:01Derrik Klassen: Like, why is why is that the way it is? I'm not I don't see the congruency there.

30:06Robert Mays: What I really noticed about the offensive line number is that the change from like even the basic level to the highest level. So going from the basic level to multiple Pro Bowls, one to four. The basic salary for the fifth year option for offensive linemen is$18 million, which is the highest number outside of quarterbacks among any of these groups. But the multiple, the franchise tag number is lower than a lot of the other premium positions. The gap between the highest and the lowest 50-year option salaries for offensive linemen is only$7.7 million. For edges, it's almost$13 million. And so the offensive line group is smoother than all the other ones.

30:47Robert Mays: And I think it's for a few different reasons. The middle tier, like the second and third tiers of offensive line salaries over the last like 10 years, those are the ones that have really increased in part because so many of the guard numbers have increased. So in 2015, you had two guards that were making above 6 % of the cap. Now there are 14 of those players. And offensive lineman number 25, so again, if we're talking about the basic level, it's salaries 3 through 25 at your position over the last five years. In 2015, offensive lineman 25 was making about 54 % of what offensive lineman number one was.

31:29Robert Mays: About half. now it's 66%. The top of the market is$30 million and offensive lineman 25 is making$20 million. And I think that's in part because of how much more, I think, playable tackles are getting. Like tackles have almost become like quarterbacks where if you're a starter, you make a certain level of money where there's not really a mid-tier salary. And then the other part of it is, as guards have gotten paid more and more, there are just so many more offensive linemen in general that are sitting at that like 20 to 23 million dollar number even though the top of the tackle market hasn't gone up that much and so how smooth the offensive line one is for a bunch of different reasons really jumped out to me as I was looking at these numbers compared to some of the other

32:12Derrik Klassen: positions I think that that helps my point that I don't really get why you have to have it classified this way because it's not as if guards and centers are not making a boatload of money in their own right like these position and especially now that i mean lender bombs leading the way obviously i guess you'd like a few more guys to catch up to inflate the center market a little bit but there are so many guards there are six or seven guards making 20 million dollars a year so i just don't know that i buy that you need to mix the tackle numbers in there to inflate this stuff and maybe and we we do this every year and and i hate it as a guy that loves interior offensive linemen i hate the idea of well you can't draft these guys that high like you can't draft why would why would you draft venga you want a number 10 overall he's a guard or francis maunoah for that part although he obviously has position flex but you want a a guy that just got drafted, who is not seen as a flexible player, people try to put a cap on how highly you can draft that.

33:22Derrik Klassen: And like, we know the position is valuable. So I've got to imagine the monetary aspect of it as part of it. And so I look at it and say, well, if you could promise that this guy's salary is not going to bounce out of control and become a top tackle salary because he played too well, maybe teams would be more willing to consider this stuff. Well, I think part of it with guards,

33:44Robert Mays: and we talked about this a lot when we were discussing running back in the lead up to the draft. It's not even just like what you're willing to pay the position. It's where you can find alternatives at the position. And so you talking about, well, Peter Skoransky is the 11th highest paid guard, and so that's worth picking up. Is Zay Flowers worth picking up as wide receiver 15 at$27 million? I would make an argument that one of the reasons that Zay Flowers is worth picking up at that number is that it is easier in free agency in any given year to find 80 % of Peter Skoransky than it is to find 80 % of Zay Flowers.

34:15Robert Mays: The 80 % of Zay Flowers player does not exist in free agency in almost any given season. Like, it just doesn't really happen.

34:23Derrik Klassen: No, that's fair. I mean, the receiver market speaks for itself. David Edwards just hit free agency this year. He did get$61 million, though. I mean, that's not top of the receiver market, but, like, that's a hefty chunk of change.

34:38Robert Mays: It's less than, but it's less than$19 million that you're paying Peter Skaratsky on that option. and significantly less than that. And so I think that's part of the argument. The thing that jumped out to me about the interior offensive linemen that I think this position almost more than any other, outside of like very specific exceptions like a Quentin Nelson, a center is almost never going to get drafted in the top 10. And so the Cowboys, when they were in this scenario with Travers Frederick, what year would it have been? The 2016, but he was drafted in 2013. 2013. So 2016. So it was 10 years ago when the Cowboys were having to make this decision about Travis Frederick.

35:15Robert Mays: He was at$8 million a year on that fifth year option because he was the 31st overall pick in the draft. So he's, you know, a salary is three through 20 or whatever it was back then, three through 25. So with Frederick, when he was up, it was 5.7 % of the cap was his fifth year option. With Linderbaum, it's 7.6 % of the cap is what he was sitting at because of the way the rules had changed. So in today's money, that's the difference between like Romeo Dobbs and Devante Adams on the market. And it's the exact same scenario with a center that it was an all pro level player that had made multiple pro bowls.

35:51Robert Mays: So for those positions that are never going to get drafted in the top 10, this is when it matters the most because it becomes solely about what you've done on the field. And I think the Frederick Linderbaum comparison is like a very instructive one because in almost every other way the situations are completely the same except for what a team had to pay the guy because of how the rules have changed it is nice that your on-field

36:15Derrik Klassen: performance can dictate how much money you're capable of earning it should yeah no absolutely my my beef is not with that it is a little bit with the idea of conflating things across positions so that your salary can be impacted by guys that play a different position. I don't like that as much. I really do like your on-field performance dictating what you're worth when it comes time to have this conversation.

36:41Robert Mays: The last thing I want to say about the interior offensive line situation, do you think the Ravens regret not picking up Tyler Linderbaum's option?

36:48Derrik Klassen: Not for the money that he wound up getting, no.

36:52Robert Mays: Well, that's what I mean. He's getting$27 million a year. Do you think the Ravens wish they had Tyler Linderbaum for$23 million on their 2026 salary cap?

37:02Derrik Klassen: Not really, because it would still be a massive jump. Like the next highest paid center, correct me if I'm wrong, is$18 million a year. It's Creed Humphrey. So even I mean, they didn't want to do this because it's a$5 million increase. And so that's that's the floor, right? Like if you if you put the option on Linderbaum for twenty three million dollars a year, then that's where negotiations start. And clearly the Ravens weren't comfortable with that just because the Raiders were willing to blow that out of the water. Like, does that does that change the Ravens opinion or do they think we'll find a guy that we can have on under club control?

37:41Robert Mays: But you don't have to pay him based off that twenty three million dollar number. I'm just saying for the last year of the deal, would you like Tyler Linderbaum on your roster this year for$23 million before you let him walk? They didn't have to extend him. This is just a fifth-year option they could have picked up. So do you think they would prefer to just one more year of Tyler Linderbaum at$23 million when you consider the current situation that they're in?

38:07Derrik Klassen: I just don't think anything that's happened would have changed their opinion on that. No, like not really. Have you seen the Ravens' current depth chart at center? I know that they're in dire straits, but if you decide not to do this, it's for a pretty obvious reason. I'm not saying it's right or wrong, but I doubt the Ravens would do it over again. I don't know. Am I crazy for thinking that? Do you think they would?

38:32Robert Mays: I wonder if they have a little bit of buyer's remorse when they looked at how the market ended up shaking out and what the alternatives ended up being and where they ended up landing. Like maybe the Ravens were just wrong about how robust this whole thing was going to be. Or just how easy it would be to find a replacement. I think that's part of the thought process, right? I mean, again, it gets back to the scarcity conversation of, well, yeah, why would we pay Tyler Linderbaum$23 million? We can find a starting center for half that on the market. And it didn't end up working out that way. They didn't end up finding one on day two of the draft.

39:05Robert Mays: They don't have a guy. And so even if they were going to have to pay a hefty premium to keep him, I wonder if even at$23 million, they prefer the Tyler Linderbaum route to the one that they ended up going down. I have no idea. There's a chance they'd be like, you're crazy. Like, we don't we never would have done that. I don't think that way at all. I just think that after the dust has settled, I'm sitting here looking at it being like, I don't know, man, I kind of would have been open to path number two now that you've laid them out in front of me.

39:33Derrik Klassen: It is funny if the Ravens thought that all through this process where they were like, we don't need to pay Tyler that we can get one of these other free agents for less. And then it's like, shit, Beatrice got that shit. May's got that. Sean Ryan's getting$11 million a year. Like, what are we supposed to do here? And then you get to the draft and we already know because Eric DaCosta told us, ah, shit, I didn't expect Slaughter and Logan Jones to go as highly as they did. Like, it would be pretty funny if the Ravens were like, we can find one for cheaper. And in two different ways, they were dead wrong about that.

40:08Robert Mays: Yeah. And there's a chance that, listen, the outcome isn't what we wanted, but we believe in the process that we followed. That's a completely acceptable answer. I just wonder if from their perspective, there's a little bit of regret. If they weren't willing to pay him 23 and he winds up making 27 a year, and I get that

40:25Derrik Klassen: he might not be under an extension. and he'd be under the tag. But my guess would be the Ravens just have a threshold and they wouldn't be willing to go over it. And I bet you even now they're probably like, we'll find our way to an option we feel okay about by August. We're not worried about it. That would be my guess.

40:45Robert Mays: Let's take one more quick break and then come back and chat a little bit about the running backs in this year's fifth-year option group. Make Mother's Day even more special at Whole Foods Market. Kick off brunch or dinner with quality cheese and charcuterie with no synthetic nitrates. Then go seafood. There's an abundance on sale at Whole Foods Market where it's all sustainable while caught or responsibly farmed. At the bakery, grab seasonal treats like their strawberry pretzel cream pie and you can't go wrong with a ready-to-heat quiche Lorraine, deviled eggs, and fresh-cut fruits to go. Celebrate mom with Whole Foods Market.

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42:30So this is the one that this might be the one I'm like most interested in when it comes to how this thing might look moving forward.

42:41Robert Mays: Because if I look at the fifth year option numbers for this entire group and I try to find like the real bargains, you know, like, again, if you compare it to the market, Van Ness for$14 million is a good price. You know, even a guy like Kalajah Kansi for$14 million is fine. Nolan Smith for$14 million is a good player. But the one that sticks out among all of these, in my opinion, B. John Robinson on his fifth-year option as a one-time Pro Bowl player is making$11 million while Zay Flowers, and again, I like Zay Flowers. I'm not trying to like shit on Zay Flowers here. I think he's just a good, let's do it this way.

43:18Robert Mays: Zay Flowers has gotten dumped on a lot. Bichon's making$11 million. Quinton Johnston's making$18 million. I feel pretty good about Bichon at$11 million. And I think the number, and with Gibbs, it's$13 million and change because he made more than one Pro Bowl. So, excuse me,$14. So, with Gibbs, it's$14.3. With Bichon, it's$11. Both of them considerably less than where Quinton Johnston is at. And one of the craziest parts about this is, in 2013, like the 2013 class, the running back fifth-year option for what would have been the basic tag back then, so salaries 3 through 25, was$5.8 million. For the 2023 class, this one, it's$6.7 million.

44:06Robert Mays: So when the Saints had to decide whether they wanted to pick up like Mark Ingram's option, it wasn't all that different than the Jags deciding what they wanted to do with Travis Achan last year.

44:17Derrik Klassen: There are so many wonderful ways in which I love this stupid game. And this is such a great encapsulation of it because the way that this stuff is all just cyclical and boomerangs around again every two to four years where I remember having conversations with you not that long ago about running back salaries, getting out of whack and falling off a cliff. and none of these guys are delivering on their deals. And now Bijan is like the value of this draft class at the number he's being paid for the quality of player that he is. And that's, you go back and look at it over a long enough time. We've got 15 years of this to look back at now.

44:57Derrik Klassen: And just the evolution of all of this is fascinating. And it's going to be ever-changing based on the deals that keep coming down the line. Like the deal that Tyler Linderbaum just signed in free agency over a long enough period of time is going to have an effect on this. It's very fun. But yeah, like Bijan at$11 million, when he gets to his fifth year, he will be accounting. I mentioned Zay's hit against the cap. Bijan's number is 3 % of the salary cap. If you wanted to make an argument that he's the best running back in football, you at least could. I'm not here to say that he is, but it's not outlandish.

45:36Derrik Klassen: And that's a hell of a value. And I did, I wanted to mention, Robert, if you're listening to this and looking at the stats at home, it's worth noting Bijan's only making$11 million on his option because he is a two-time Pro Bowler. He was an alternate one of those years. And you have to make the initial roster to get that counted towards your performance bonus. So Bajon is making 11. Jameer Gibbs is making 14 because he's been on two initial Pro Bowl rosters, which just as an aside, the fact that Bajon Robinson's 2024 season did not land him on the initial Pro Bowl roster is crazy. And it just speaks to the running renaissance we've had here over the last couple of years that that could be true.

46:26Robert Mays: Yeah, there's just so many like crazy data points associated with a running back number specifically. In 2014, the Saints declined Mark Ingram's fifth-year option. When they did that, he would have been the 11th highest paid running back in the league. Again, I'm like the equivalent to the basic one. Now, that running back is paid his number, running back 21 with the same designation. It goes from 11 to 21. So that's one. The one that really jumped out to me, Saquon's fifth-year option was less than his fourth-year salary because he was the second overall pick in the draft. and the another one that was very recent that like okay this makes total sense it kind of reminds me of like what in theory a team could do with say flowers if they wanted to because of the fact that the one plus one pro bowl thing is the same as the uh franchise tag the raiders declined the option for josh jacobs in his fifth year and then they just tagged him for 10 million dollars well if the tag if the fifth year option is guaranteed but you know the franchise tag is not going to be that much higher, then you can decline the option because you know you can tag the player.

47:29Robert Mays: You don't want to do that in a lot of positions, but at running back, you could easily do something like that because the tag just isn't that much higher than the fifth year option for a lot of these guys. So running back is just almost in a completely different situation than almost any of these other positions outside of like maybe tight end, which we can talk about. But it brings me back to something I was talking about with Barnwell three weeks ago, right before the draft. It's like, I think you can make an argument that with a number like$11 million for Bijan is the 50 or option number for an elite caliber running back, actually an argument for why it might be worth taking a running back in the first round.

48:05Derrik Klassen: Are the nerds going to embrace running backs now?

48:08Robert Mays: No, because we hit this from every single category, like the scarcity and everything else and would be the ability to find the production later on. Like there are a lot of factors fighting against that, but I do think it's at least one point in the column for drafting a running back that high. Early on, the fifth year option exercise numbers for running backs were horrendous. Like for the first five or so years, running back was one of the worst things you can do. But I'd make an argument that that was as much a product of the running backs not being as good than it was the position being the problem and how a team was allocating its resources.

48:44Robert Mays: Like it's different when it's Trent Richardson than it is if you're investing in a guy like Bijan Robinson. And I think that we've seen the difference in that. the flip side of this is i would imagine i'd be pretty surprised if bijan and jameer gibbs

49:01Derrik Klassen: even get to their fifth year option or at the very least i think the falcons and lions will extend them both and what do those numbers look like and how does that affect the calculus here over the next four or five years when those deals are factored into all of this and the effect that that's going to have on jeremiah love or ashton jenty or whoever else might be coming down the pipe because i don't know i don't know would you guess bijan and gibbs in particular like how close do you think those guys are going to come to sniffing saquon and christian mcafree or is that just not even attainable i why wouldn't it be that's what i'm asking you i mean i would i mean

49:44Robert Mays: I absolutely think it should be. I mean, the Saquon deal is that's, that just happened. Like, I don't think the Saquon deal, if you're, if you're Bijan's agent, I have no idea how the Saquon deal is not like the starting point. Like I would be, if that number should not be any less than 20 million for either of those players. And I think that is because of what the recent deals, the position have looked like. And I also just think like we've gone too far. like if jsn's gonna make 42 million dollars bichon should absolutely make more than 20 million dollars like even if there's a gap in like the actual value of those players the gap is not that big and again with something we talked about with barnwell this is about like overall value and replaceability and things like that but like when you've seen the on-field impact the on-field impact is not a$22 million difference between Bijan Robinson and JSN.

50:40Robert Mays: It's just not.

50:41Derrik Klassen: So that's what makes this so fascinating is I don't disagree with anything you just said, but if Gibbs and Bijan are making$21 million a year, then all of a sudden that starts to affect this calculus moving forward. And it's not going to be long before you're like, Ooh, running backs are expensive. I don't know if I want to use that tag and have the tag number be 15 16 million dollars that's like four years in the future though that's like four years now before we have to start worrying about that we'll talk about it in 2030 which is interesting because

51:16Robert Mays: there are moments where one player actually does do some lifting here and the example of that in this class so the interior defensive line more than one pro bowl designation is 27 million dollars which jalen carter got so they picked up jalen carter's 27 million dollar option my assumption I get not being able to do all of the math on it, but I have to imagine that Aaron Donald's deal is doing some heavy lifting when it comes to that number specifically, because it's the franchise tags, the top five salaries over the last five years. Donald was making 31 million five years ago. And so that number has to still be affecting what a guy like Jalen Carter is getting on his fifth year option.

51:57Robert Mays: So he should be sending Aaron Donald like an edible arrangement or something when it comes to when that check starts to clear. It also just speaks to how hard it is to find that guy at that position.

52:11Derrik Klassen: And that is one I would expect. If you have a guy who hits those parameters, we're never going to debate this. We're never going to be like, should they put the option on this game-wrecking interior defensive lineman? Of course not. They're going to do that every single time, no matter how high the number gets.

52:29Robert Mays: and I also think again it's the the Jalen Carter at 27 or even like the Zay at 27 and you're sitting there being like man that seems like a lot of money well it is a lot of money but I think that the inability to replace those players matters like it's very hard to replace those players like you're it's you're not going to find a Jalen Carter-esque player on the free agent market like that's just not going to happen even if he might not be worth 27 million dollars in a vacuum

52:57Derrik Klassen: because of the health. What's funny, I didn't set out on this show to shit on Zay Flowers. I think he's a good football player, but I don't bat an eyelash at Jalen Carter for$27 million. And even if Zay is, even if 27.3 million is wide receiver 15, I bat a couple eyelashes at that. Like that's kind of like where the bill comes due for the maintenance you had done on your house. And you're like, well, I know it's important And I don't want to I don't want to not have a good foundation on my home, but I really don't want to fork this money over. Like, that's kind of how it makes me feel. But it's not even just that it's wide receiver 15.

53:37Robert Mays: It's a 14 million dollar gap between that and the top of the wide receiver market. That's Kalevan Chason and free agency. That's a lot of money. Like, that is a huge, huge gap. And that it's even bigger. That's like the Quentin Johnston thing where it's like, man, Quentin Johnston for 18 million dollars. That's a lot. It's a$24 million gap between Quentin Johnston and the top of the market. And when you think about it that way, it does become a little bit easier to pick up his option. I think you win me over with that and thinking about the conversations we've had about what's available on the free agency market.

54:13Derrik Klassen: Like if you don't want to chase after Alec Pierce, and then I guess you've got Romeo Dobbs, but it's slim pickings beyond one or two names in a given year, if you're lucky. And so even if it does feel like a steep price, the alternative is not having good wide receivers. So I probably need to think of it more like that and less about what the money says.

54:37Robert Mays: I looked at the tag numbers just because I was really curious about it when it came to how the tag stacks up at the position for every single position. So if the tag for wide receivers is now wide receiver 15, because again, the tag has averaged over the last five years, that's just an indication of how fast the wide receiver market has exploded. So right now, the wide receiver tag is wide receiver 15. That's Zay and George Pickens. Those are the two guys making it this year. For other positions, for offensive line, it's offensive line eight. For tight ends, it's tight end four. For defensive tackles, again, the Jalen Carter thing, it's defensive tackle three because that market hasn't really gone up over the last few years since Aaron Donald said it.

55:19Robert Mays: Chris Jones is still at 31. For corners, it's cornerback eight. For safeties, it's in the top five. So most of those are clustered around each other. They're all in the top 10, some higher, some lower. The three positions where it's in a completely different set of considerations. For wide receivers, it's wide receiver 15. For edges, it's edge 14. and for quarterbacks, it's quarterback 14. So that just shows you how fast over the last five years those salaries have exploded. With quarterbacks, we understand how we get there, right? Like the quarterback market has gone crazy as the salary cap has gone up.

55:54Robert Mays: For edges and wide receivers, it almost feels like we had an arms race between those where it was Bosa and then Jefferson and then it was Chase and those guys were like the highest paid non-quarterback. It just started stacking up and up and up. Right now, we talked about the difference between Quentin Johnston being$18 million and$42 million. The playtime edge rate, right? So nobody got that picked up. But theoretically, the playtime edge rate for a guy like Van Ness would have been$15 million. The top of the edge market now is$50 million.

56:27Derrik Klassen: No, I mean, the value there is undeniable.

56:30Robert Mays: It's crazy how fast that happened at wide receiver and edge specifically. And the fact that the edge one has gotten so, I mean, just ludicrous in the five years that we, the five years that go into these averages just showed you how fast that market has exploded. And with quarterbacks, we can talk about that now with quarterbacks, it's quarterback 14. I think with some people, when they heard that Bryce Young's option was getting picked up, it's kind of like, oh man, Panthers are going to pick up Bryce Young's option with all the questions around Bryce Young. Well, it's$26 million. You kind of have to do that.

57:05Robert Mays: Like that's less than any established starting quarterback in the league. That's above Malik Willis. That's it. And that's, again, how fast that number has exploded.

57:14Derrik Klassen: The state of things in the quarterback market, like that shouldn't surprise you. It's taken all the drama out of it. For zero time did I think that the Panthers wouldn't pick up Bryce Young's option, even if they're not sold on him as the quarterback of the future. is just that's just good business to get adequate starting quarterback play at middle of the market pricing like it's just that's not even a dilemma well for quarterbacks the way the fact that we

57:44Robert Mays: treat it the same as we average the quarterback salaries as every other position doesn't really make sense because there are only 15 quarterbacks they're going to be paid like starting quarterbacks at any given time a good chunk of the other guys are going to be on rookie salaries and then a good chunk of the other guys are going to be on not even bridge, like barely bridge contracts. The drop-off usually happens at like quarterback 15. So if you look at it, there was a 50 % drop-off five zero in 2022 in the AAV between quarterback 14 and 15. Tom Brady was at like 15 million. Ryan Tannehill was at like 30 million.

58:20Robert Mays: And so that drop-off that gets factored into what we're talking about right now with Bryce Young and CJ Stroud. In 2024, it was the same for quarterback 19 to quarterback 20, where there was this massive 50 % drop off. And those numbers get, are still impacting what we're talking about with this group and the fifth year options getting picked up. So the fact that we're including quarterback 20 in whether or not Bryce Young's fifth year option gets picked up doesn't really make sense in the same way it might make sense for including quarterback or tackle 20 in whether Paris Johnson's option gets picked up,

59:00Derrik Klassen: if that makes sense. It's a lot of numbers and math you just threw at me, if I'm being honest. But I think the upshot is that, aside from it just being such a valuable position, that is also why everybody's constantly chasing a quarterback and you're always going to see quarterbacks get overdrafted because not only is the upside unbelievable if you hit on the guy and he's actually good, but even if he's just a dude, the savings of having that guy on a cost-controlled contract, it's astronomical. And so if you don't have a franchise quarterback, you're just cycling through those types of guys. And it would be nice if we had a larger middle class of quarterbacks, but the finances of the way this is all structured discourage it.

59:50Robert Mays: and even beyond the middle class of quarterbacks right like the middle class of quarterbacks does exist right now like that 33 million dollar cutoff that like sam darnold and baker mayfield are at that does exist now it didn't really exist three or four years ago that's the problem is that sam darnold that one year 10 million dollar deal that sam darnold's playing on with the vikings

1:00:11Derrik Klassen: that's now 20 million dollars for malik willis would you okay there is a middle class of quarterbacks but it's like four guys but even that's more than it used to be i mean fair but that i don't know that doesn't that's that doesn't feel big enough still i don't know the solution to it but yeah like you've got baker darnold uh i guess you could throw daniel jones in there stafford's obviously his own thing because he's 38 years old but like it's still not a huge group

1:00:41Robert Mays: of guys gino is in there as well so like gino just got kicked out of there there were like three or four of them in a way that there hadn't been before. But now I think the middle class is still depends on how you define the middle class, right? Like would you, if Malik Willis is a middle-class quarterback at$22 million, you throw that in there as well. But the, the bridge quarterback, like the real bridge quarterback contract that got extinguished last year when Justin Fields got paid$20 million a year on the Darnold deal.

1:01:09Derrik Klassen: But we talked about this on the rebuilding show on the like buying or selling show is malik willis a middle class quarterback or is he a dart throw because like 67 million dollars for a starting quarterback in the current landscape just doesn't i don't think it registers that much like if you can cut malik willis after a year and not suffer for it is that a genuine investment at the sport's most important position i would argue no the darts became more expensive i guess that's what i would say like you had to go

1:01:40Robert Mays: you had to put that deposit at the bar yeah you had to give them your id now where it used to be like you just toss them a couple bucks there's like something real to lose now if you forget to return the darts holy shit we're doing id exchanges for darts now what happened so it's the quarterback thing again it's and it's funny how far removed we are from like the choice the giants made a few years ago where for them it was like oh we don't want to pay daniel jones 22 million dollars fully guaranteed and because they didn't do that that's why they had to do what they did with the contract extension for daniel jones and so i think how quickly the quarterbacks considerations have changed even in the last few years is very telling when you compare like how i think how easy the bryce young choice was and the fact that the giants didn't end up making the

1:02:29Derrik Klassen: daniel jones choice that's i've i feel like we're not that far removed where we used to go back and forth about this like is such and such quarterback worth picking up is is he worth playing on that option and now even though Bryce Young has been underwhelming relative to his draft slot it's still a no-brainer to pick up his option and the guys that are worth arguing about are guys like Jack Campbell who are awesome but have some wonky shit going on with with how they're classified

1:03:03Robert Mays: Well, to bring it all back around, I think Jack Campbell's going to be okay. I hope. He's going to be fine. I hope Jack Campbell's okay with the way that this works out when free agency time comes around next year. Or he's looking at what the market is going to be like in free agency, and the Lions are like, here, here's a top three deal with the position. You good with that? I think either way, independent of a catastrophic injury, which we're all rooting against, Jack Campbell's probably going to be okay with the way this all worked out. Jack Campbell's like, please stop worrying about me.

1:03:35Derrik Klassen: This is great.

1:03:37Robert Mays: Jack Campbell's a hearty Iowa boy. I'm sure that even he'll rub some dirt on him if something happens. All right. That is all we've got for today. We will be back tomorrow. Derek is going to be back tomorrow. Looking forward to it. On tomorrow's show, it's a little cold takes revisited. Something we do early in every single offseason. Going back and looking at the worst opinions that we had about the 2025 season, heading into the 2025 season, and maybe what we can learn from how wrong we were way back when. So very much looking forward to that conversation. We'll be back tomorrow. Appreciate you guys listening.

1:04:13Robert Mays: We'll talk to you very soon. Thanks for tuning in. Make sure to hit that subscribe or follow button so you never miss an episode. If you enjoyed what you heard, please like, comment, and leave a rating. We'll see you next time.

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