0-

“Bosa-Break the Bank”

-0-

They cheered wildly in the Chargers draft room in April when the first two picks went -Quarterback-Quarterback- in the NFL draft in April..

That meant San Diego would get the player they had researched, studies, interviewed, worked out, and targeted for more than a year.

Joey Bosa of Ohio State was coming to San Diego to fill a desperate need, a quality pass rusher, a fierce go-get-the quarterback guy, the man with the motor that runs all the time, because he is football all the time.

Now they have him, and they cannot get him signed.

We are 5-weeks away from the start of NFL training camps, and he is the only top high pick unsigned. All the others have their money, and the off-set-buyout language in their contracts, all except Bosa.

He’s unsigned because the Chargers don’t want to pay him the slotted bonus money he is due, a 17M-package of guaranteed money, all part of the new collective bargaining agreement. He’s due the money because all NFL teams agreed to the slot system.

But the Chargers want to defer a chunk of the money over the five year length of the contract. Some clubs do that, others don’t.

CAA, who reps Bosa, wants most all of the money upfront, to invest as their experts see fit. The Chargers haven’t had this high a pick since the Eli Manning-Philip Rivers days, and the landscape of the NFL has changed.

The agent has a right to demand the payment. Bob Kraft does it in New England. Jerry Jones has in Dallas. Paul Allen ditto in Seattle with recent high picks.

The Bolts ownership wants to defer the payments into a schedule that would be made each year over the first four years. The agents response, if you’re going to keep a chunk of Bosa’s 17M-guaranteed, then you can pay us interest on top of the bonus, for payments due in years two-three-four.

The Chargers want to pay flat fees. Bosa’s people say you cannot keep his money from him, without a reward, interest payments.

There was also an argument about off set language, if the Chargers were to cut him before the end of the contract. But that’s just semantics. They’re not going to cut him, and he’s not going to be a bust. And if he is a bust, what kind of money would he get from a 2nd team that signs him. The off set language is wasted rhetoric.

So it comes down to this question, why are the Chargers nickel and dimeing a player they think can make them a playoff team, in an area they are so deficient in talent, pass rusher?

Don’t they have the cash at hand to do this deal? All the Stockton real-estate the Spanos’ family bought, now sits undeveloped in a bankrupt city? The team is raking in profits, everyone does in the NFL.

You wanted this player so badly, and how you can’t find a way to bridge this deal, when everyone in the NFL has done that with the top twenty picks.

A poor business model to operate by, especially when you consider all the free agent money GM-Tom Telesco and cap guy Ed McGuire pissed away the first three years of the operation of this leadership group, some 35M in wasted bonus money.

Bosa as a pick is not a mistake. The money you gave Derek Cox and other free agent busts was a mistake.

The Chargers shouldn’t compound past mistakes by making more mistakes, especially since you fell in love with him a year ago. Show him the money, show him the love.

-0-

Please follow and like us: