Last season when Ravens’ owner Steve Bisciotti visited with us on the Ravens Rap in Ocean City, MD, as he so often does he spoke candidly about topics concerning his team. One of those topics was Joe Flacco.
At the time of the show (early November) it was Bisciotti’s opinion that it would not take $40 Million guaranteed to sign Flacco to a new long-term deal. I wonder if he still believes that.
One thing that we know for sure, Flacco’s price isn’t going to come down.
While he isn’t of the caliber of the Saints’ Drew Brees (who just signed a deal for 5 years, $100 Million which by most counts includes NFL-record $60 million in guaranteed payola) Brees’ deal did move the needle on franchise quarterback tags in a northerly direction along with the average price for Top 10 signal callers.
So waiting to get a new Flacco deal will NOT favor the Ravens.
And something tells me waiting won’t do much for Joe the Quarterback either.
Flacco has shown in the past to grow a bit testy with the media when there’s extreme redundancy in the questioning. What might happen if Flacco isn’t performing well early in the season? Will questions about his contract become more pointed and will they elevate the pressure?
Everyone within the Ravens organization has hitched their wagon of hope to Flacco. He’s unanimously viewed as the franchise quarterback. And at 27 Flacco should be able to perform to the value of his contract throughout a 7 year term.
Do the right thing and get this deal done not during the season, not after the season – NOW!
Here’s the deal: 7 years, $90M with escalators to take it to $105M.
And sorry Steve, the guaranteed dollars are $40M.
