2nd round picks

[charlie813brown]

I am confused about 2nd round pick contracts.
"2018: UFA or Option - Top 10 (franchise $), pick 11-32 (transition $)"

I was under the impression they would be controlled after 4 years on the rookie contract. Anyone care to explain further.

[Goodell]

I am confused about 2nd round pick contracts.
"2018: UFA or Option - Top 10 (franchise $), pick 11-32 (transition $)"

I was under the impression they would be controlled after 4 years on the rookie contract. Anyone care to explain further.

That additional year at a franchise/transition higher salary value (with no guaranteed money remaining by that time) is just for first rounders. Most first rounders having a transition tag amount value option with top 10 picks overall having a franchise tag amount team option.

It used to just say the same message there for all (hence the 'UFA or option') but I've tweaked that a bit now to just show what applies to a particular pick specifically.

[charlie813brown]

So I am correct in that they will be controlled UFA's (unlimited bids) and not UFA's that we have to release to prevent an option?

[Goodell]

So I am correct in that they will be controlled UFA's (unlimited bids) and not UFA's that we have to release to prevent an option?

That's not something that's been announced as a rules change and still something I'm looking at with system changes and reworking rules documents ahead. It would remain as it is now (top positional salary option for that last year with no guaranteed money at that time). That option for those players being signed now is years away still, so I can't speak for sure how things will be 5 years from now especially in this case of this much discussed optional year where we'll learn a lot more about how these things tend to play out in the NFL very soon which may impact how we adjust for that reality.

We still have not really seen how ANY of this has played out in the NFL to know if it's going to be common for former first rounders who do not get their options picked up to mostly be gone from their teams or mostly to return under other arrangements. Players impacted in reality are still under those rookie deals and we should know a lot more next year for how it mostly is working out in NFL. It still something being monitored for how to best simulate that reality here and largely still an untold story yet to fully play out.

For players with such options from drafts years ago, there were rules in place at that time related to that then, and contracts structured for the rules set at that time. In more recent drafts we've been using a placeholder amount (999,999,999 or 888,888,888) to allow the system to recognize those cases and possibly give us more avenues there ahead.

I know some are very concerned about this topic and it's much discussed, but many of our sim situations are shaped to best replicate what COMMONLY happens in the NFL in cases that involve human negotiations since we have computers here and not human players/agents. We do not know what commonly happens in the NFL for former first rounders who do not get their option picked up yet I don't believe. People may passionately guess what will happen in the future or what they believe should happen here based upon what they want for their sim team here, but it's still something we have to monitor and adjust ahead as seems most reasonable and most doable within systems programming. If most of the former first rounders who do not get their options picked up still stay on with their drafting teams in large order under different more affordable arrangements, I think that makes a strong case to change our rules and rework everything and add new layers of programming to treat those players differently than we have to better reflect common NFL situations where that's happening a lot with those cases. However, if most of the former first rounders who don't get their options picked up have that happen because they are going to be gone from their drafting teams, that seems to fit more with the original rules we setup in that regard for a high salary unguaranteed year tacked to the end of their deal for a team to keep deserving players that extra year at high salary or say goodbye.

No player has been impacted by this yet, as those new rookie deals with 5th year options don't expire for the first time until next year. That continues to give us some time to monitor what's commonly happening in the NFL in these regards to adjust here if we feel our rules on that should be changed. I imagine it will be a much discussed topic again and very timely next off-season prior to our free agency where those players impacted will face that situation directly at that time. It is possible I'll have an announcement on that prior to then, as I've been working on tweaking some of our systems and working on rules documentation and possibly a new league(s) before NFL season starts depending upon how the next few weeks go. It's possible that we may give teams in that situation next off-season the option to have me manually adjust those on a case-by-case basis. It's possible all the programming will be completely re-worked and rules changed before those rookie contracts expire. For now, there were rules set in place for that situation and that hasn't changed at this time -- but something we're monitoring and listening and thinking about for how to best handle when our sim decisions have to be made next off-season for those players.

[Goodell]

We may not even have a lot of indication of what will commonly happen yet with these type of players (former first rounders who do not get their 5th year option picked up) with the NFL's first batch of players with that option, as almost all of the good ones had their options picked up and bad ones let go. Only a couple guys in the middle are still on their teams with options not picked up with their future to be determined still. We'll continue to see new draft classes each year and see how that develops as to whether we should change our rules to better reflect reality. NFL's first draft class with those options:

No. 1 pick Cam Newton, Carolina Panthers: option picked up.
No. 2 pick Von Miller, Denver Broncos: option picked up.
No. 3 pick Marcell Dareus, Buffalo Bills: option picked up.
No. 4 pick A.J. Green, Cincinnati Bengals: option picked up.
No. 5 pick Patrick Peterson, Arizona Cardinals: option picked up and contract extended.
No. 6 pick Julio Jones, Atlanta Falcons: option picked up.
No. 7 pick Aldon Smith, San Francisco 49ers: option picked up.
No. 8 Jake Locker, Tennessee Titans: OPTION NOT PICKED UP, still on team in a make-or-break season to determine his future.
No. 9 pick Tyron Smith, Dallas Cowboys: option picked up, contract extended.
No. 10 pick Blaine Gabbert, Jacksonville Jaguars: OPTION NOT PICKED UP, gone.
No. 11 pick J.J. Watt, Houston Texans: option picked up.
No. 12 pick Christian Ponder, Minnesota Vikings: OPTION NOT PICKED UP, still on team.
No. 13 pick Nick Fairley, Detroit Lions: OPTION NOT PICKED UP, still on team.
No. 14 pick Robert Quinn, St. Louis Rams: option picked up.
No. 15 pick Mike Pouncey, Miami Dolphins: option picked up.
No. 16 pick Ryan Kerrigan, Washington Redskins: option picked up.
No. 17 pick Nate Solder, New England Patriots: option picked up.
No. 18 pick Corey Liuget, San Diego Chargers: option picked up.
No. 19 pick Prince Amukamara, New York Giants: option picked up.
No. 20 pick Adrian Clayborn, Tampa Bay Buccaneers: OPTION NOT PICKED UP, still on team.
No. 21 pick Phillip Taylor, Cleveland Browns: option picked up.
No. 22 pick Anthony Castonzo, Indianapolis Colts: option picked up.
No. 23 pick Danny Watkins, Philadelphia Eagles: OPTION NOT PICKED UP, gone.
No. 24 pick Cameron Jordan, New Orleans Saints: option picked up.
No. 25 pick James Carpenter, Seattle Seahawks: OPTION NOT PICKED UP, still with team.
No. 26 pick Jonathan Baldwin: OPTION NOT PICKED UP, gone.
No. 27 pick Jimmy Smith, Baltimore Ravens: option picked up.
No. 28 pick Mark Ingram, New Orleans Saints: OPTION NOT PICKED UP, still with team.
No. 29 pick Gabe Carimi: OPTION NOT PICKED UP, gone.
No. 30 pick Muhammad Wilkerson, New York Jets: option picked up.
No. 31 pick Cameron Heyward, Pittsburgh Steelers: option picked up.
No. 32 pick Derek Sherrod, Green Bay Packers: OPTION NOT PICKED UP, still on team.

To me, it's worked very much like we setup going into that where the guys who are deserving as starting players now get their options picked up almost all the time, and players who fail for the most part aren't usually players teams want back at all anyway. Of course there are a couple of rarer cases of guys that fall somewhere in the middle between success and failure, but from NFL history on that so far not many.

When we introduced this bit of reality here we essentially picked up the option on all players that first draft class in structuring their deals as we did here initially, where just like NFL teams now ours are in situations where they can still let those guys go even with higher salary options without any salary cap penalty next off-season because no guaranteed money. I suspect most of our teams that unfortunately drafted the Gabbert-types have pretty easy decisions just like their NFL teams did in letting them go without a moment's of hesitation or wishing they had more control over failed players, but may also be some examples otherwise too ahead. We still have yet to see how not picking up an option most commonly impacts a player's future (and interest in staying) if he remains on the team in NFL.

For draft classes beyond that where we started using the placeholders, we did that to possibly give us a way to do more with them in our system ahead or at least incorporate more accurate option figures in the future as that information became available.

[charlie813brown]

So I am correct in that they will be controlled UFA's (unlimited bids) and not UFA's that we have to release to prevent an option?

I was under the impression that option money was only for 1st round picks. and 2nd round picks were controlled UFA's after year 4.

[Goodell]

So I am correct in that they will be controlled UFA's (unlimited bids) and not UFA's that we have to release to prevent an option?

I was under the impression that option money was only for 1st round picks. and 2nd round picks were controlled UFA's after year 4.

Right. The options relate to first round picks.

When you asked "So I am correct in that they will be controlled UFA's (unlimited bids) and not UFA's that we have to release to prevent an option?" I guess I thought you were talking about options which only apply to first rounders and many of the discussions about option years this past off-season.

For second rounders, their contracts look something like this with one of your players as example:

2014: 420,000
2015: 611,663
2016: 803,326
2017: 994,989
2018: UFA

The 2nd rounder would be under contract in 2014, 2015, 2016, and 2017. After that, like usual when a player's contract expires here he'd be an unrestricted free agent. All UFAs that are not cut and just have their contract expire always have that unlimited bidding advantage for previous team during peak free agency.