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NFL Random Thought of the Day

Cooper Kupp sustained an Grade II hamstring tear Aug 2......and pushed too hard too quickly.........respect the injury...........

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Cooper Kupp day-to-day after “setback” with hamstring
By Josh Alper
Published August 31, 2023 05:29 PM

Rams wide receiver Cooper Kupp returned to practice a little over a week ago and said that he felt like he was on track to play in the season opener after missing time with a hamstring injury, but his availability has become a little cloudier.

Head coach Sean McVay told reporters on Thursday that Kupp suffered a “setback” with the hamstring. McVay called the injury a strain and said that Kupp is considered day-to-day as the team moves closer to their opening game against the Seahawks.

The fact that Kupp’s condition took a turn for the worse after several days of practice would seem to be reason for the Rams to exercise extra caution before turning him loose again.

Van Jefferson, Ben Skowronek, Tutu Atwell, Puka Nacua, and Demarcus Robinson are the other receivers on the Rams’ 53-man roster.
 
Respect the injury.........

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George Kittle’s groin injury has lingered, keeping him out of practice this week
By Charean Williams

Published August 31, 2023 05:53 PM

49ers tight end George Kittle played 12 snaps in last week’s preseason finale. Kittle, though, isn’t practicing this week as he deals with a lingering groin injury.

“It’s still lingering a little bit from when he has missed some time,” coach Kyle Shanahan said, via David Bonilla of 49erswebzone. “And we’re not going to practice him today either, and hopefully, we can get him going on Monday.”

Kittle missed the first two games of last season with a groin injury.

He missed practice time during training camp with the strain, including sitting out joint practices with the Raiders.

“I think there’s always concern when something persists, and this has kind of lingered,” General Manager John Lynch said Thursday on KNBR. “George usually has about one of these things a year, and then once he gets through it, he’s good. And so, knock on wood that’s the case.

“The great thing about George, he attacks it. We miss him when he’s not on the field, not only because of his ability but just the energy he brings. And so there has been a little void here the last few days, but we’re trying to get him right.”

Kittle has not played a full season since his second season of 2018, and he has missed 16 games in six seasons.
 
Burrows and his agent should not allow him to play before he gets a new contract. Talking about getting him back early from his injury with high risk of re-injury as well as limited performance is at very least unwise, and probably truly stupid.
 
Derrick Henry: Running backs just want their share
By Mike Florio
Published August 31, 2023 11:43 PM

They remain fan favorites, and in many cases they are the best athlete on the team. They’re nearly as fast as the fastest player, nearly as strong as the strongest player, and often the toughest in a room full of legitimately tough guys.

But running backs still can’t get what they should, thanks to a system rigged against paying them what they deserve.

Titans running back Derrick Henry, one of the best running backs in recent years and still one of the very best in the league, knows that the men who play his position have more value than their salaries suggest.

“Have you all witnessed it? I’m pretty sure you all have,” Henry said, via Teresa M. Walker of the Associated Press. “So yes, just trying to show that we are valuable as any other position. They use us in commercials and all over the place. And we just want our share due.”

It’s hard for them to get it. Careers can be short. Injuries can make them shorter. And many do their best work while laboring under a slotted rookie deal.

“All you can do is try to be the best player you can and hope the team understands your value and appreciate you trying to do the best you can to carry the load to help your team win games and get to the Super Bowl,” Henry said.

Some teams do, some teams don’t. Some teams take a strict analytics-based approach, gauging a player’s value against the cost of a replacement. They conclude that, dollar for dollar, they can do better by not paying a veteran running back significant money and moving forward with a younger, cheaper, healthier option.

Henry plays for a team that knows his value to the overall effort.

“We’ve relied on Derrick as a large part of our offense and our success, and he’s had a level of consistency to be able to handle a workload,” coach Mike Vrabel said, via Walker.

As many teams embrace a platoon approach at the position, not many running backs play the old-school role of wearing down a defense over four full quarters, churning up consistent yardage and potentially breaking a long run through a battered assortment of men who have grown weary of trying to tackle a player who in many cases gets better and better with the more carries he receives.

Rule changes aimed at supercharging passing games don’t help. But in a league with so much emphasis on the passing game, there’s an opening to turn the clock back to the days when it took effort and heart and will to bring down a battering ram of a running back, especially since practices now consist of far less tackling to the ground.

But the players who make up the passing game — and the effort to counter passing attacks — get more money. The analytics crowd attributes it to surplus value. Still, it seems odd the No. 2 receivers routinely make as much or more than the top tailbacks in football.

Whether it’s collusion or coincidence, it’s out of whack. The problem is that running backs have no real solution. The union can’t rob Peter to pay Paul, and the league has no reason to do anything about it.

As the season approaches, there’s nothing the running backs can do at this point but demonstrate their value. Then, after the season, they need to continue to try to find ways to force real, meaningful, long-term solutions. Even if they will be hard to find.
 
NFL slot machines debut on casino floors
By Mike Florio
Published September 1, 2023 10:23 AM

Money changes everything.

It wasn’t that long ago that the NFL, hiding firmly behind its pearl-clutching hatred of All Things Gambling, prevented Tony Romo from hosting a fantasy football convention at a hotel owned by a casino. Even though there was and would have been no gambling on the property.

Now, the NFL is all in. Figuratively and literally.

Via Mick Akers of the Las Vegas Review-Journal, NFL Super Bowl Jackpots slot machines made their debut on Thursday at casinos in Southern California, Oklahoma, and Connecticut. They will show up in Las Vegas, Arizona, Florida, Massachusetts, and Oregon this month.

Consider the names of the machines. The words “Super Bowl” are among the most zealously guarded of all NFL-owned intellectual properties. Companies who don’t fill the NFL’s coffers with cash have to call it the “Big Game” or something like that, or face cease-and-desist orders. Now, the words will be intertwined with the most basic of gambling activities — the one-arm bandit that is specifically designed to ensure that, over time, the player loses and the house wins.

It’s another example of the NFL’s inherent hypocrisy regarding gambling, a two-faced approach that makes it difficult if not impossible to have any true moral authority regarding efforts to impose and to enforce gambling-related rules against players.

Eventually, there will be a reckoning. Until then, the league will keep stuffing as much money as possible into its pockets.
 
On brink of season, Michael Irvin’s status with NFL Network remains unknown
By Mike Florio
Published September 1, 2023 11:21 AM

In only four days, NFL Network’s signature show, Game Day, will broadcast a 2023 season preview. The question of whether one of the four primary broadcasters will appear on the show remains unresolved.

Rich Eisen hosts, and Kurt Warner, Steve Mariucci, and Michael Irvin serve as analysts. But the league has still not decided whether to put Irvin back on the air.

Irvin, a Hall of Fame receiver, remains on ice for something he allegedly said to an employee of a Phoenix-area Marriott hotel during Super Bowl week. The league has suspended him, for months, based on these alleged comments to someone who was not a co-worker, at a time when Irvin was not working.

Few, if any, other employers would take such action. He has not been charged. He has not been sued. Someone made a complaint about him for something he did when he wasn’t on the job. Someone who isn’t even one of his colleagues.

That doesn’t excuse any improper language he might have used, obviously. But think of the standard this creates. Are people suspended from their jobs for months because they gave someone the finger in a public place? Because they got into an argument with someone at the store?

Yes, the NFL has a Personal Conduct Policy that polices off-duty behavior. But unless and until the NFL is willing and able to apply the standard that has been applied to Irvin to others (specifically owners) who have engaged in bad behavior away from work, Irvin should be immediately reinstated.

Stephen A. Smith, who worked with Irvin at ESPN, recently expressed concern regarding the treatment Irvin has experienced.

“I think it’s a travesty what happened to Michael Irvin over the last few months,” Smith said on his podcast, via Brandon Contes of AwfulAnnouncing.com. “There was a woman, allegedly, supposedly, whether it was her or the company itself, that accused him of saying something inappropriate or whatever the case may be. The NFL, meaning the NFL Network, sent Michael Irvin home from the Super Bowl. Pulled him from their coverage. . . .

“That was bad enough, but for him have an accusation levied against him that ultimately jeopardized his career? And to this day all we’ve seen is a 45-second video of him conversing with a young lady in the lobby and then walking away. And she walked away. We have no audio. We have no accusations that extend beyond that specific experience. For him to be off the airwaves since February, to be off the airwaves that long and to have his job in jeopardy, his future in jeopardy, is a travesty.”

Smith is concerned that there may be a racial component to Irvin’s extended state of limbo.
“I have to admit to you as a Black man that it was incredibly scary,” Smith said. “And it’s something that I articulated to some folks in positions of power at various networks who will remain nameless. When I came to the defense of Michael Irvin, I hesitated because again we didn’t have all the facts. And I said, ‘Okay well let’s see it.’

“But when week after week and month after month went by and not a damn piece of evidence came forward, I said, wait a minute, somebody who doesn’t happen to be Black, who is a female gets to stand before a Black man for 45 seconds, nobody hears what they said to one another.
He didn’t touch her other than to shake her hand if that. And they walked away from each other, and that’s all it takes for this man to lose his career? What the hell does that say about the rest of us?”

Again, the fact that Irvin was off the clock and that the person who complained was not an NFL co-worker makes a strange situation even stranger. The fact that FS1 has since hired Irvin to no backlash at all shows that he is employable.

While Irvin works for NFL Network, NFL Network is the NFL. There is no distinction, no firewall. The league is calling the shots on this.

At some point — very soon if not today — the man whose autograph is on every football needs to pick up the phone and ask someone beneath him what precisely in the hell is going on here?
 
Just found another reason to dislike Disney.........

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Spectrum, Disney fight is “not the typical carriage dispute”
By Mike Florio

Published September 1, 2023 01:29 PM


In the usual fight between a cable provider and a content provider, it’s a matter of money. For the sudden fight between Spectrum and Disney, it goes deeper than that.

“This is not the typical carriage dispute,” Charter Communications Chief Executive Chris Winfrey said on a Friday call with analysts, via Joe Flint of the Wall Street Journal.

The situation is keeping ESPN and ABC away from nearly 15 million Charter customers nationwide.

The issue is streaming. Charter objects to forcing its customers to subsidize streaming operations, without getting access to the streaming services. Charter claims it has agreed to financial terms requested by Disney (which owns ESPN and ABC), but that Charter wants ad-supported version of Disney+, ESPN+, and Hulu to be included in the package for Spectrum customers. Disney won’t do it.

Charter pointed out in a statement that Disney’s effort to prioritize streaming has resulted in significant viewership declines in sports and other areas.

“I’m disappointed that Disney so far has insisted on higher prices forcing customers to take their products when they don’t want them or can’t afford them and asking us to require customers to pay for direct-to-consumer apps, their linear fees already paid for,” Winfrey said on the call.

The clock is ticking. Spectrum operates in New York and Los Angeles. And the first Monday night game of the year is only 10 days away.
 
sports.yahoo.com

NFL will not discipline Tyreek Hill for incident at marina

Dolphins wide receiver Tyreek Hill said last month that he was not concerned about getting suspended by the league as a result of a June altercation at a Florida marina and he has no reason to change that view.
sports.yahoo.com sports.yahoo.com

Dolphins wide receiver Tyreek Hill said last month that he was not concerned about getting suspended by the league as a result of a June altercation at a Flori...
 
Never underestimate the influence of injuries on the bottom line money line.

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Will business considerations keep the Cardinals from playing Kyler Murray in 2023?
By Mike Flori
Published September 2, 2023 08:40 AM

As the Cardinals tank without admitting that they’re tanking, they have another way to fuel the fire that will burn down their 2023 season.

They have a legitimate business reason for keeping their best player off the field for the entirety of the coming campaign.

As noted this week by Mike Lombardi on Pat McAfee’s show, Murray has millions in injury guarantees that will become fully guaranteed in the not-too-distant future. If a player can’t pass a physical on the date the guarantees convert, the team cannot avoid the financial commitment.

It’s not an uncommon approach. When the Colts initially benched Matt Ryan for the rest of the 2022 season, it was to avoid having his 2023 injury guarantees become fully guaranteed. When the Raiders yanked Derek Carr for Jarrett Stidham late in 2022, the goal was to preserve the ability to dump Carr (which they did) before $40 million in injury guarantees could vest.

If the Cardinals are contemplating a future without the first pick in the 2019 draft, it definitely makes good business sense to keep him on the Physically Unable to Perform list not just for the first four weeks but for the entire 2022 season.

Here’s the full breakdown of the Murray contract. He has $29.9 million in 2025 compensation that becomes fully guaranteed in March of 2024. Thus, if he suffers an injury this season and can’t pass a physical by March, the Cardinals will be on the hook for his $37 million in 2024 (that’s unavoidable at this point) and another $29.9 million in 2025. (Murray also has another $26.8 million in 2026 injury guarantees.)

Although a trade after 2023, if that’s what would happen, would shift much of the money to a new team, Murray’s new team might not want to take on nearly $67 million, fully guaranteed. Especially if he can’t pass a physical in March.

So the best way to keep their options fully open with Murray is, as Lombardi noted, to keep him off the field. That approach has the very important added benefit of entrusting the quarterback function to Josh Dobbs and/or Clayton Tune — ensuring that the Cardinals will sink to the bottom of the standings and, in turn, rise to the top of the 2024 draft order.
 
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Perceived as a hard ass, a soft heart inside. RIP big guy.

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Bill Parcells gave $4 million to his former players who were in need
Published September 2, 2023 08:04 AM

Maybe Bill Parcells always seems a litte grumpy so that no one will ask him for money. Because when his former players do, he gives it to them.

In all, he has given a lot of money to his former players.

Appearing Friday on WFAN, former New York-area sports writer Gary Myers explained that
Parcells gave millions to former players, with no expectation the money would be repaid.
“Bill has loaned out $4 million to 20 players that played for him, who come to him in this financial crisis,” Myers said, via Ryan Glasspiegel of the New York Post. “Bill knows when they come to him it’s a last resort.”

Myers said he asked Parcells why he would do that, given that Parcells also didn’t expect to get his money back. Said Parcells to Myers: “These guys have sacrificed so much for me with their bodies and their commitment.”

It’s one of the stories in Myers’s forthcoming book, Once A Giant: A Story of Victory, Tragedy, and Life After Football. It focuses largely on the 1986 Giants, the team Parcells led to the franchise’s first Super Bowl win.

“People are going to find out how Bill Parcells has made this transition from a guy who had love-hate relationships with his players to the patriarch of that ’86 team, now that Wellington Mara has been gone for awhile and Bill has had his 82nd birthday recently,” Myers said, per Glasspiegel.

Now that the cat is out of the bag regarding the Big Tuna’s generosity, he should probably keep his phone turned off. And not just because people will be contacting him for a quote or two. The quickest way to become a target for requests for money is to become known as someone who has a habit of giving it away.

That said, Parcells apparently is willing to do what he can to help those who played for him, whether with the Giants, the Patriots, the Jets, or the Cowboys.

“He’s put away money he needs for the rest of his life, he’s given money to his kids, and what he has left he’s designated to help those close to him who need it,” Myers said.

Maybe other coaches are already doing the same thing for their former players, and we just don’t know about it. Or maybe other coaches will read this and become inspired to help their former players who have fallen on hard times — especially if those hard times arise from the overall physical toll those players absorbed while answering the coach’s call to run straight into the tangle of bodies that has left their own bodies broken.
 
CloakNNNdagger said:
Perceived as a hard ass, a soft heart inside. RIP big guy.

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Bill Parcells gave $4 million to his former players who were in need
Published September 2, 2023 08:04 AM

Maybe Bill Parcells always seems a litte grumpy so that no one will ask him for money. Because when his former players do, he gives it to them.

In all, he has given a lot of money to his former players.

Appearing Friday on WFAN, former New York-area sports writer Gary Myers explained that
Parcells gave millions to former players, with no expectation the money would be repaid.
“Bill has loaned out $4 million to 20 players that played for him, who come to him in this financial crisis,” Myers said, via Ryan Glasspiegel of the New York Post. “Bill knows when they come to him it’s a last resort.”

Myers said he asked Parcells why he would do that, given that Parcells also didn’t expect to get his money back. Said Parcells to Myers: “These guys have sacrificed so much for me with their bodies and their commitment.”

It’s one of the stories in Myers’s forthcoming book, Once A Giant: A Story of Victory, Tragedy, and Life After Football. It focuses largely on the 1986 Giants, the team Parcells led to the franchise’s first Super Bowl win.

“People are going to find out how Bill Parcells has made this transition from a guy who had love-hate relationships with his players to the patriarch of that ’86 team, now that Wellington Mara has been gone for awhile and Bill has had his 82nd birthday recently,” Myers said, per Glasspiegel.

Now that the cat is out of the bag regarding the Big Tuna’s generosity, he should probably keep his phone turned off. And not just because people will be contacting him for a quote or two. The quickest way to become a target for requests for money is to become known as someone who has a habit of giving it away.

That said, Parcells apparently is willing to do what he can to help those who played for him, whether with the Giants, the Patriots, the Jets, or the Cowboys.

“He’s put away money he needs for the rest of his life, he’s given money to his kids, and what he has left he’s designated to help those close to him who need it,” Myers said.

Maybe other coaches are already doing the same thing for their former players, and we just don’t know about it. Or maybe other coaches will read this and become inspired to help their former players who have fallen on hard times — especially if those hard times arise from the overall physical toll those players absorbed while answering the coach’s call to run straight into the tangle of bodies that has left their own bodies broken.
Click to expand...
I shouldn't have RIPed Parcells....................he is still with us.!
 
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CloakNNNdagger said:
Cooper Kupp sustained an Grade II hamstring tear Aug 2......and pushed too hard too quickly.........respect the injury...........

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Cooper Kupp day-to-day after “setback” with hamstring
By Josh Alper
Published August 31, 2023 05:29 PM

Rams wide receiver Cooper Kupp returned to practice a little over a week ago and said that he felt like he was on track to play in the season opener after missing time with a hamstring injury, but his availability has become a little cloudier.

Head coach Sean McVay told reporters on Thursday that Kupp suffered a “setback” with the hamstring. McVay called the injury a strain and said that Kupp is considered day-to-day as the team moves closer to their opening game against the Seahawks.

The fact that Kupp’s condition took a turn for the worse after several days of practice would seem to be reason for the Rams to exercise extra caution before turning him loose again.

Van Jefferson, Ben Skowronek, Tutu Atwell, Puka Nacua, and Demarcus Robinson are the other receivers on the Rams’ 53-man roster.
Click to expand...

I believe a lot of people (players, coaches, trainers and doctors) need to learn to understand and respect the injury.......Kupp's initial injury was a Grade II tear on August 2........he returned to plactice August 21.............less than 3 weeks...........way too early, especially for his position. Bad decision making for all involved, just to try to beat the clock to opening day.........something that is happening around the League to many players.

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Cooper Kupp visits a “body specialist” to understand hamstring issue
Published September 2, 2023 04:46 PM

Rams receiver Cooper Kupp recently had a setback to his training-camp hamstring injury. Coach Sean McVay, who has a history of downplaying the severity of injuries, has described Kupp as “day-to-day.”

Today’s development suggests that Kupp won’t be playing any day soon.

Ian Rapoport of NFL Media reports that Kupp has traveled to Minnesota to see a “noted body specialist to further understand his hamstring issue.” The goal, per the report, is to determine the “root of the issue,” given that Kupp has had two pulls in one summer.
(By the way, what the hell is a “noted body specialist”?)

The description of the latest situation as a “setback” doesn’t completely mesh with this new notion that he has had two separate pulls. Anyone who has had a hamstring injury knows that the key to healing the injury is to rest. And to rest some more. And then, when you think it’s fine, to keep on resting.

You’ll believe the injury is healed because you’re walking fine and jogging fine and even running fine. And then, when you try to reach the highest possible gear, that grab happens and you’ve had a setback.

If for Kupp it’s a setback and not a completely new injury.
Regardless, it sounds as if Kupp won’t be back on the field any time soon, and especially not in eight days, when the Rams start the season at Seattle.
 
To little surprise, Antonio Brown’s tenure as arena league owner was a disaster
By Mike Florio
Published September 3, 2023 10:42 AM

As the last Sunday without football until the non-Pro Bowl unfolds, there’s a new #longread about the short tenure of former NFL receiver Antonio Brown as the owner of an indoor football team.
Brown invested in, and eventually took over, the Albany Empire. On his watch, the franchise was run straight into the ground.

Nothing in the story from ESPN.com is surprising, beyond the fact that ESPN.com felt compelled to devote so much time and so many words to such a sad, predictable, and tired subject. Beginning with the moment he learned the Steelers had named JuJu Smith-Schuster and not him the team MVP for the 2018 season, Brown became a tempest in a T-shirt.

From his effort to agitate his way out of Pittsburgh to his frozen feet and ill-fitting helmet with the Raiders to his effort to agitate his way out of Oakland to his short stint with the Patriots to his short-lived salvation with the Bucs to his striptease sayonara at MetLife Stadium and plenty of other stuff (lawsuits, sexual-assault allegations, a suspension, criminal assault charges, and more), Brown has had what should have been the final chapters of a Hall of Fame career become a nightmare of a novella as to all the things a guy can do to turn his life inside out and upside down.

Brown’s final exit from football came in the spring, as he applied the many erratic behaviors of the past four years to a team in the National Arena League. Shockingly (actually, not), Brown made bad decisions (including insisting that the team practice in Albany, which carried a $1.5 million workers compensation tab), Brown didn’t pay bills, and Brown made idle threats to those who challenged him.

The most bizarre aspect of the new story relates to players raising directly with Brown the team’s failure to properly pay tribute to Mo Ruffins, a former Empire offensive lineman who died in 2022. Things allegedly got heated, with Brown saying to an assistant, “Hey, man, you still got the AR in the car? Go get it.”

Brown also bristled at efforts by players to get paid for their work. Money is still allegedly owed, and litigation could be coming.

Again, none of it is surprising. The only surprise is that people still seem to be surprised by any of this — and that media outlets feel compelled to devote resources to a failed former football player who is acting in a manner consistent with his current character.

The only real question is whether Brown (as he recently suggested on social media) is suffering from Chronic Traumatic Encephelopathy, or whether he’s got an incurable case of asshole. If it’s the former, we hope he finally gets the help he needs.

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I was asked to review and evaluate this article last year. It is the best simple source you will find, not only of Antonio Brown's potential status which was used as a "spring board" for the discussion, but also for an understanding of CTE in general. Definitely worth reading for following this subject. :


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Monday, January 3, 2022 - 12:00


On the Question of Antonio Brown and CTE
By Dr. Chris Nowinski, Concussion Legacy Foundation co-founder and CEO

For years, the erratic behavior of NFL All-Pro wide receiver Antonio Brown has been a cause for concern as many have watched and worried for his mental health. In Sunday’s Tampa Bay Buccaneers game, Brown had another episode of abnormal public behavior. After a sideline dispute with Bucs coaches, he took off his shoulder pads and jersey, threw his shirt and gloves into the stands, performed jumping jacks for the crowd, and walked off the field. He is no longer a member of the team.

THE WHOLE STORY
 
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Last year's concussion resulted in him not clearing the protocol for 2 1/2 weeks. And although no one is talking about it, but he has suffered 4 documented concussions just since Dec 2018.

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Denzel Ward remains out of practice for Browns
By Myles Simmons
Published September 4, 2023 11:30 AM

As the Browns gear up to play the Bengals for Week 1, they are still without one of their key defensive players.

According to multiple reporters on the scene, Cleveland cornerback Denzel Ward is not practicing on Monday and remains in concussion protocol.

Ward suffered the head injury during the Browns’ last preseason game against the Chiefs. Cleveland played most of its starters in that exhibition contest while Kansas City did not.

The No. 4 overall pick of the 2018 draft, Ward has been one of the Browns’ best defensive players for years. In 2022, he recorded 15 passes defensed, three interceptions, and took two fumbles back for touchdowns in 14 games.

Cleveland will issue its first injury report of the season on Wednesday.
 
badboy said:
sports.yahoo.com

Minnesota Vikings 2023 NFL Preview: Maybe you heard, they were pretty lucky last season

The Vikings had a shocking record in close games last season.
sports.yahoo.com sports.yahoo.com

The Vikings had a shocking record in close games last season.
Click to expand...
Wow. Like turnovers, it seems some years, a teams get all the breaks or turnovers. However, most teams seems to find themselves going from one extreme to the other. I wouldn't be surprised if this year, they have a losing record in close games.
 
It's good that he didn't suffer an ACL rupture. But hyperextension which he suffered today in practice is a common cause of ACL tears. From the information I have received, he has suffered a Grade I ACL, the same type of injury he sustained in 2020. They will re-evaluate his knee when the swelling goes down. Even Grade I ACL tears weaken the ligament, making it easier to extend or complete the tear. The reason that they will re-evaluate is because with the large amount of swell his injury has caused along with pain on positioning, MRIs may be only ~80-85% accurate as to the extent of an ACL injury. Either way, the weakening caused by the Grade I weakens the ligament making it increased risk for extension if brought back too soon..............and it is way too soon for the opener Thursday.

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Report: Travis Kelce is not believed to have suffered long-term knee injury
 
With player guarantees being pushed higher and higher and longer and longer, I'm still waiting for "I did such a horrendous job, I demand that my guaranteed salary be cut substantially and returned"

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For NFL players, “honor your contract” is misplaced
By Mike Florio

Published September 5, 2023 11:54 PM

When NFL players who are under contract decide to take a stand in an effort to get a better contract, many fans and media respond with a three-word refrain.
Honor your contract.

It’s not nearly that simple, for two important reasons.

First, NFL players are parties to two equally important contracts. Beyond the contract each player signs with his team, all players are parties to the contract between the NFL and the NFL Players Association. That contract — the Collective Bargaining Agreement — grants players specific rights relevant to their individual contracts, such as the ability to hold out from training camp in exchange for the payment of fines for doing so.

The employer doesn’t sue the player for breaching his contract. The CBA creates the remedy if the player holds out. He pays the fines set forth in the broader contract.

Both documents apply to the relationship between player and team. And it’s the CBA that takes precedence; that’s the global contract that delineates the rights and responsibilities of labor and management.
Second, these are not the normal, bilateral contracts. It’s a one-way street, with the only protection for the players coming from any guaranteed money in the deal.

As explained on Tuesday’s PFT Live, if your boss approaches you tomorrow with an offer for a five-year contract but the contract ties you to the arrangement but not the company, you’d be pissed. NFL player contracts basically operate that way.

The player is bound for as long as the team wants him to be. The team is bound only as long as it cares to be.

Chiefs defensive tackle Chris Jones believes he has outperformed the final year of his contract. So he’s trying to get a raise. If the Chiefs had believed he was underperforming, they would have torn it up.

That’s their right. But it proves the point. This isn’t a normal contractual setting. The system is mostly rigged for the teams. The players have options under the CBA.

When a player takes advantage of those options, he’s not violating his contract. He’s respecting the limited rights afforded to him under a system that favors the employers so significantly that it compels players to sign contracts that, in a normal employment environment, few employees would be willing to sign.
Honor your contract.

Remember those words the next time the employer tears up a contract and cuts a players loose — especially if they do it just before the season starts and the player has no real options to find comparable work with another team.
 
CloakNNNdagger said:
With player guarantees being pushed higher and higher and longer and longer, I'm still waiting for "I did such a horrendous job, I demand that my guaranteed salary be cut substantially and returned"

***************

For NFL players, “honor your contract” is misplaced
By Mike Florio

Published September 5, 2023 11:54 PM

When NFL players who are under contract decide to take a stand in an effort to get a better contract, many fans and media respond with a three-word refrain.
Honor your contract.

It’s not nearly that simple, for two important reasons.

First, NFL players are parties to two equally important contracts. Beyond the contract each player signs with his team, all players are parties to the contract between the NFL and the NFL Players Association. That contract — the Collective Bargaining Agreement — grants players specific rights relevant to their individual contracts, such as the ability to hold out from training camp in exchange for the payment of fines for doing so.

The employer doesn’t sue the player for breaching his contract. The CBA creates the remedy if the player holds out. He pays the fines set forth in the broader contract.

Both documents apply to the relationship between player and team. And it’s the CBA that takes precedence; that’s the global contract that delineates the rights and responsibilities of labor and management.
Second, these are not the normal, bilateral contracts. It’s a one-way street, with the only protection for the players coming from any guaranteed money in the deal.

As explained on Tuesday’s PFT Live, if your boss approaches you tomorrow with an offer for a five-year contract but the contract ties you to the arrangement but not the company, you’d be pissed. NFL player contracts basically operate that way.

The player is bound for as long as the team wants him to be. The team is bound only as long as it cares to be.

Chiefs defensive tackle Chris Jones believes he has outperformed the final year of his contract. So he’s trying to get a raise. If the Chiefs had believed he was underperforming, they would have torn it up.

That’s their right. But it proves the point. This isn’t a normal contractual setting. The system is mostly rigged for the teams. The players have options under the CBA.

When a player takes advantage of those options, he’s not violating his contract. He’s respecting the limited rights afforded to him under a system that favors the employers so significantly that it compels players to sign contracts that, in a normal employment environment, few employees would be willing to sign.
Honor your contract.

Remember those words the next time the employer tears up a contract and cuts a players loose — especially if they do it just before the season starts and the player has no real options to find comparable work with another team.
Click to expand...

Smart players would bet on themselves. Never go beyond 1-3 years and collect 50-70% of the contract as a guarantee/signing bonus. See how Tunsil handled himself, he controls his future and which team it’s with.
 
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OptimisticTexan said:
Smart players would bet on themselves. Never go beyond 1-3 years and collect 50-70% of the contract as a guarantee.
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Not every player gets to negotiate with the Texans.

Most teams need to add years to the contract in order to afford the signing bonus, which is guaranteed to the player. The key for the players is to make the last years on the contract so onerous that the team has to comeback with an extension and more guaranteed $$$. Chris Jones agent probably thought they had done that with a $28 million cap hit in 2023. The Chiefs are saying they can handle that, play your contract out. The Chiefs can still hit Jones with the franchise tag in 2024, so they have the cards right now.
 
Caleb Williams wrestles with the “completely backwards” nature of the draft
Published September 6, 2023 10:08 AM

USC quarterback Caleb Williams will likely be the first pick in the 2024 draft. If he submits to the 2024 draft. He might decide to stay in school for another year, make NIL money, and see what happens in 2025.

Regardless, as the leap to the NFL approaches, Williams and his father are beginning to realize there’s something counterintuitive about the NFL draft.

“I’ve always been able to choose the team that I’ve played on, and then everything’s been scheduled for me,” Williams told Sam Schube of GQ. “But now, going into this next part of my career, it’s weird [because] it’s so uncertain. You don’t know anything. You can’t control anything but you and how you act. That’s honestly the weirdest part for me, is the uncertainty.”
But he does have some control, beyond how he acts. His father, Carl, knows what it is. Caleb can skip the 2024 draft, if he doesn’t want to play for the team with the first pick.

“The funky thing about the NFL draft process is, he’d almost be better off not being drafted than being drafted first,” Carl Williams told Schube. “The system is completely backwards. . . . The way the system is constructed, you go to the worst possible situation. The worst possible team, the worst organization in the league — because of their desire for parity — gets the first pick. So it’s the gift and the curse.”

With the caveat, as Carl Williams said, that Caleb gets “two shots at the apple. . . . So if there’s not a good situation, the truth is, he can come back to school.”

But the situation in 2025 might not be any better, since once again the worst team will earn the top spot in the draft. So instead of running from it, why not take charge of it?

Caleb Williams has more control than he currently realizes. He can tell the team holding the first overall pick, “Don’t bother.” And he can back it up with action, refusing to sign a contract if the team holding the first pick takes him.

Many think that, five years after the Cardinals bottomed out for Kyler Murray, they’re hoping to do it again for Williams. Williams can tell them he won’t play for them. He can set terms as to what could get him to change his mind.

Far too rarely do great prospects take control of the draft process. John Elway did it 40 years ago. Eli Manning did it 20 years ago. Maybe it’s time for someone to do it again. Maybe it’s time for it to happen more frequently.

It needs to. That first stop for a player’s career, especially at quarterback, is critical. Would Patrick Mahomes have become Patrick Mahomes if he’d been drafted by the Browns in 2017? He benefited from slipping far enough for a great organization to spring up to get him.

Maybe someone will spring up to get Williams. Regardless, Williams needs to realize that should not just submit to the process. He has power. He has leverage. He has control, beyond the possibility of returning to USC for another season.
 
CloakNNNdagger said:
Caleb Williams wrestles with the “completely backwards” nature of the draft
Published September 6, 2023 10:08 AM

USC quarterback Caleb Williams will likely be the first pick in the 2024 draft. If he submits to the 2024 draft. He might decide to stay in school for another year, make NIL money, and see what happens in 2025.

Regardless, as the leap to the NFL approaches, Williams and his father are beginning to realize there’s something counterintuitive about the NFL draft.

“I’ve always been able to choose the team that I’ve played on, and then everything’s been scheduled for me,” Williams told Sam Schube of GQ. “But now, going into this next part of my career, it’s weird [because] it’s so uncertain. You don’t know anything. You can’t control anything but you and how you act. That’s honestly the weirdest part for me, is the uncertainty.”
But he does have some control, beyond how he acts. His father, Carl, knows what it is. Caleb can skip the 2024 draft, if he doesn’t want to play for the team with the first pick.

“The funky thing about the NFL draft process is, he’d almost be better off not being drafted than being drafted first,” Carl Williams told Schube. “The system is completely backwards. . . . The way the system is constructed, you go to the worst possible situation. The worst possible team, the worst organization in the league — because of their desire for parity — gets the first pick. So it’s the gift and the curse.”

With the caveat, as Carl Williams said, that Caleb gets “two shots at the apple. . . . So if there’s not a good situation, the truth is, he can come back to school.”

But the situation in 2025 might not be any better, since once again the worst team will earn the top spot in the draft. So instead of running from it, why not take charge of it?

Caleb Williams has more control than he currently realizes. He can tell the team holding the first overall pick, “Don’t bother.” And he can back it up with action, refusing to sign a contract if the team holding the first pick takes him.

Many think that, five years after the Cardinals bottomed out for Kyler Murray, they’re hoping to do it again for Williams. Williams can tell them he won’t play for them. He can set terms as to what could get him to change his mind.

Far too rarely do great prospects take control of the draft process. John Elway did it 40 years ago. Eli Manning did it 20 years ago. Maybe it’s time for someone to do it again. Maybe it’s time for it to happen more frequently.

It needs to. That first stop for a player’s career, especially at quarterback, is critical. Would Patrick Mahomes have become Patrick Mahomes if he’d been drafted by the Browns in 2017? He benefited from slipping far enough for a great organization to spring up to get him.

Maybe someone will spring up to get Williams. Regardless, Williams needs to realize that should not just submit to the process. He has power. He has leverage. He has control, beyond the possibility of returning to USC for another season.
Click to expand...

Florio created drama for clicks.
 
CloakNNNdagger said:
Caleb Williams wrestles with the “completely backwards” nature of the draft
Published September 6, 2023 10:08 AM

USC quarterback Caleb Williams will likely be the first pick in the 2024 draft. If he submits to the 2024 draft. He might decide to stay in school for another year, make NIL money, and see what happens in 2025.

Regardless, as the leap to the NFL approaches, Williams and his father are beginning to realize there’s something counterintuitive about the NFL draft.

“I’ve always been able to choose the team that I’ve played on, and then everything’s been scheduled for me,” Williams told Sam Schube of GQ. “But now, going into this next part of my career, it’s weird [because] it’s so uncertain. You don’t know anything. You can’t control anything but you and how you act. That’s honestly the weirdest part for me, is the uncertainty.”
But he does have some control, beyond how he acts. His father, Carl, knows what it is. Caleb can skip the 2024 draft, if he doesn’t want to play for the team with the first pick.

“The funky thing about the NFL draft process is, he’d almost be better off not being drafted than being drafted first,” Carl Williams told Schube. “The system is completely backwards. . . . The way the system is constructed, you go to the worst possible situation. The worst possible team, the worst organization in the league — because of their desire for parity — gets the first pick. So it’s the gift and the curse.”

With the caveat, as Carl Williams said, that Caleb gets “two shots at the apple. . . . So if there’s not a good situation, the truth is, he can come back to school.”

But the situation in 2025 might not be any better, since once again the worst team will earn the top spot in the draft. So instead of running from it, why not take charge of it?

Caleb Williams has more control than he currently realizes. He can tell the team holding the first overall pick, “Don’t bother.” And he can back it up with action, refusing to sign a contract if the team holding the first pick takes him.

Many think that, five years after the Cardinals bottomed out for Kyler Murray, they’re hoping to do it again for Williams. Williams can tell them he won’t play for them. He can set terms as to what could get him to change his mind.

Far too rarely do great prospects take control of the draft process. John Elway did it 40 years ago. Eli Manning did it 20 years ago. Maybe it’s time for someone to do it again. Maybe it’s time for it to happen more frequently.

It needs to. That first stop for a player’s career, especially at quarterback, is critical. Would Patrick Mahomes have become Patrick Mahomes if he’d been drafted by the Browns in 2017? He benefited from slipping far enough for a great organization to spring up to get him.

Maybe someone will spring up to get Williams. Regardless, Williams needs to realize that should not just submit to the process. He has power. He has leverage. He has control, beyond the possibility of returning to USC for another season.
Click to expand...
He can sit out a lose a yr of his career if he wants too. Maybe he ends up with a worse situation in 2025. If he sits out 2024 then that's what I am rooting for to happen in 2025.
 
Saints rookie quarterback Jake Haener will miss the first six games of the season.............he was nailed for violating the league’s performance-enhancing drug policy. He states that he has no idea how the substance got into his body. :rolleyes:
 
CloakNNNdagger said:
I believe a lot of people (players, coaches, trainers and doctors) need to learn to understand and respect the injury.......Kupp's initial injury was a Grade II tear on August 2........he returned to plactice August 21.............less than 3 weeks...........way too early, especially for his position. Bad decision making for all involved, just to try to beat the clock to opening day.........something that is happening around the League to many players.

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Cooper Kupp visits a “body specialist” to understand hamstring issue
Published September 2, 2023 04:46 PM

Rams receiver Cooper Kupp recently had a setback to his training-camp hamstring injury. Coach Sean McVay, who has a history of downplaying the severity of injuries, has described Kupp as “day-to-day.”

Today’s development suggests that Kupp won’t be playing any day soon.

Ian Rapoport of NFL Media reports that Kupp has traveled to Minnesota to see a “noted body specialist to further understand his hamstring issue.” The goal, per the report, is to determine the “root of the issue,” given that Kupp has had two pulls in one summer.
(By the way, what the hell is a “noted body specialist”?)

The description of the latest situation as a “setback” doesn’t completely mesh with this new notion that he has had two separate pulls. Anyone who has had a hamstring injury knows that the key to healing the injury is to rest. And to rest some more. And then, when you think it’s fine, to keep on resting.

You’ll believe the injury is healed because you’re walking fine and jogging fine and even running fine. And then, when you try to reach the highest possible gear, that grab happens and you’ve had a setback.

If for Kupp it’s a setback and not a completely new injury.
Regardless, it sounds as if Kupp won’t be back on the field any time soon, and especially not in eight days, when the Rams start the season at Seattle.
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Kupp won't be playing week 1 and is likely to go on IR. Poor decisions lead to poor results.
 
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