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Hall of Fame
Winslow, Poston Reject Contract
By Pat McManamon, Editor
This report filed July 30, 2004
Kellen Winslow and his agents did not accept a contract offer from the Browns that would have paid him the same as Sean Taylor, who was selected one pick in front of Winslow in the draft.
As a result, Winslow will not be present when the Browns open training camp Friday afternoon.
The Browns and Winslows agent, Kevin Poston, talked into the evening on Thursday before discussions ended.
On Friday, the Browns released a statement from team president John Collins stating their case.
Collins said the Browns had offered Winslow the same deal that Taylor signed with the Washington Redskins. Taylor was the fifth pick in the draft, Winslow the sixth. Protocol typically calls for Taylor to make more money, but since he signed first the Browns matched his offer.
Given the close personal and competitive relationship between Kellen and Sean Taylor, as well as their equal talent level on different sides of the football, we did not want to penalize Kellen for being picked one slot below his former teammate, Collins said in the statement. Faced with the opportunity to get Kellen in camp on time, we made our best offer.
That means the Postons did not agree to an offer that would have paid Winslow $13 million in guaranteed money and allowed him to earn $40 million over six years, figures that have been published about Taylors deal.
The $40 million is the maximum Taylor can earn if he reaches his incentives. A league source said those incentives are tied to Pro Bowl appearances, but the Browns tied their incentives to Winslow based on catches because Pro Bowl voting can be subjective, a source said.
The teams release also said that its offer to Winslow would have given him more money than Kansas City tight end Tony Gonzalez. Gonzalezs deal, signed after a lengthy holdout prior to the 2002 season opener, earns him $22 million over five years, an average of $4.4 million.
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JMO, but NFL teams need to work on pushing money down from the top 15 players into the lower draft positions. With Manning getting a $20 mil signing bonus (2nd largest ever), Gallery getting $18.5, we are seeing rookies with lots of "potential" exceed the contracts of proven pro-bowlers and blow up the franchise numbers on their initial contracts. Just don't understand how teams can justify paying a rookie more than what a pro-bowler would get as an UFA.