FanNation - The Republic of Sport

Arizona has a football team?

no sir! We do not hate on Arizona lol, my Cards are on the rise! HOWEVER, I absolutely despise Larry Fitzgerald and I think Rod Graves is a complete idiot. Who in sin negotiated this contract...Larry be a darn team player, ya will get your money hommie...it's just a question of when!

Larry pack your stuff and come to philly!

sarolls ...Philly cannot afford him..No one can. 31.5 coming his way this year and next.. Garanteeeeed.. Why would he redo a contract like that. He is a Card no matter what....

the cards need to trade him to my ravens for some defensive talent and solidify that defense that's getting better but not there quite yet...

Exactly, 50yearfan, nobody can afford him at that rate. He's got the Cards hostage, and they can barely afford to keep him. In fact, I even wrote about this on my blog last week:
http://www.thesportsbloggers.com/NFL/put-the-knife-down-larry-t40.html?sid =e7cb0709820e7fbdfc6c3840653545ce

So it's basically an impasse. LF's salary will keep them from signing quality free agents and will drive up the prices on everyone both on and off the team (if he's getting major coin, why should they settle for less?). And it means probably another year before this team starts to contend, even though ticket prices won't go down. Ugh, I'm so glad I never buy the season tix.

come back home and play w/ TJ and AD!!

Did a Cards fan above just say that they don't like Fitzgerald?!? All he does is catch 90 balls a year, yeah that really sucks.

In other news, The three best players on the Cardinals, Fitzgerald, Bolding, and Wilson are all free agents in one year. That's some serious pi-ss poor front office management.

Problem is, Fitzgerald will demand so much money that no team will be willing to take on that kind of contract without all the other pieces in place. Cowboys have a history of dealing with Arizona, but I don't see the Cowboys paying that much for Fitzgerald. Maybe Boldin.

Why would he take a pay cut for a team that has little to zero chance of being a solid Superbowl Contender before he is too old to contribute? Just cut him already and let him sign on with a team that has a shot of making something of a season in the near future.

A team with such a crappy front office that manages to have 3 of your top players go free all at once...doesn't deserve such a great WR.

I didn't realize how bad a situation is contract is, they may just have to part with him to save face and their future free agents. I know the Vikings want him bad, maybe they could find away...this will be interesting to see what happens.

pack up and move home larry Minnesota's waiting and God knows with AD and CT in the backfield it opens up the field for you and T-Jack to tear it up

The Cards could keep him a year and then trade him the following season when the cap hit will be diminished. Get some value out of him now and then more value in trade for him later.

Cutting him will only penalize the team with the cap and then they have one less WR to throw to for Warner/Leinart.

If they can re-sign him long term and spread that money out and still give him a raise then they might win out. Otherwise this is some fine mess Ollie.

Of course we know the Cardinals ordinarily don't mess up player contracts.

"Apparently, Fitzgerald brought a gun, a mask and a pen when he arrived in Tempe to sign his rookie deal."

Now this is a piece of fine journalism fit for the Smithsonian.

Personally, I find it funny that the Cardinals finally manage to draft a few players that have lived up to the hype and now they wont be able to write the check because they put absurd escalators in his contract that he actually reached. Imagine that, a player drafted number 3 overall that actually exceeded expectations. At least he didn't end up being a scrub like when they got stuck with Andre Wadsworth in 98.

That being said, I don't think they can keep Fitzgerald at his cap number. He is a very good receiver and his best football is still ahead of him but his cap number is $14 and I think $13 million the next 2 seasons. That is way too much money for a player that can't carry a team by himself. Bret Favre and Marino were players in their prime that could carry a team all by themselves. Fitzgerald is not in that class. He had back to back great seasons and they didn't make the playoffs in either season. If they keep him there is no room for them to improve the team except through the draft. It will hurt, but I think they have to try to trade him and Minnesota would be a good place since they have the money and he has family there.

TheJazz ..Not so sure it is a bad thing to lose those three contracts all at once. May be a good thing. The Cards have way toooo much money tied up in three players and one facet of their game. If they are to go to the next level, they will have to find a middle ground and spread the money/talent around more....

Come back home homie the vikings need you!

I can't fault Larry for demanding the guarantees! What IDIOT would settle for less? You wrote the contract Graves, now pay the piper you shyster!
Any Cardinal fans that despise Larry are not Cardinal fans at all. JUST HATERS!

It's funny that when a player is set to make a large amount of money, people want them to "be a team player". BS. Being a team player in the NFL just gets you less money. The contracts are written to give the owners the leverage and power. They wrote the contract, never once believing he'd actually live up to the hype and achieve the goals. Well...pay the piper. I guarantee that if he'd been caught making it rain or something equally stupid, they'd have had *NO PROBLEM* going after the money they paid him.

Get your money Larry, and then leave via free agency. The Bidwells don't want to win.

It's really not the end of the world for AZ. What they need to do is to RESIGN him to a LONG-TERM DEAL. They convert the $31M into bonus money and give him a more reasonable yrly salary. Say, $20M in signing, and a $5+M roster bonus for next yr, plus yrly salaries around $4M or $5M.

His total compensation would increase to $33-35M, (and they could reduce this as they see fit), but his cap number for these 2 yrs would go down, if this were spread over 6 or 7 yrs. Instead of having a cap number of $15.5M, it would be $7M this yr (4M in salary and $3M in prorated bonus), and about $12M next yr w/ the roster bonus. These are much more manageable numbers.

Of course, you've got to convince Larry to stay in the desert. You can't even trade or cut him under his current deal cuz the cap hit is too much.

In fact, it's possible this deal actually PROTECTED the Cardinals. This contract appears to be back loaded. If Fitzgerald was a bust, they'd have cut him before his contract had these bloated salaries, and they wouldn't have taken the hit to the cap for it, just the acceleration of his original signing bonus(which looks like it was about $4M per yr)