The Chargers announced that they agreed to terms with Pouncey on a two-year deal this afternoon. Pouncey, a center who has played his entire career with the Dolphins, was released last week after declining to take a pay cut. There’s no immediate word on how much money he’s making with the Chargers. After starting all 16 games for the Dolphins last year, Pouncey should start at center for the Chargers this year. He’ll supplant Spencer Pulley, the Chargers’ starting center from a year ago, who is now likely to be demoted to a backup spot. The 28-year-old Pouncey was the Dolphins’ first-round pick in 2011 and spent seven years in Miami. He has been selected to three Pro Bowls.
Sad news- I wish the guy luck though. That's the one part of NFL contracts I have never understood...the player has to abide by every single word, yet the team can cancel the "contract" at any time and for any reason.
Wow. 7.5mill a year or 10mill for 1 year. That's some cash if he can't stay healthy. Hated to see him go. I know a lot of people on this board didn't like him. Time will tell if he can hold up this next year. Good luck to him.
It's because the Player's Union didn't negotiate guaranteed salaries like in basketball and baseball. What gets me is that knowing all this, fans get pissed off at players for chasing money.
You wanna know why fans get pissed? Take someone like Kirk Cousins who hasn't won a playoff game and is making ~28 mil a year now? That's way more than Tom Brady who has won 5 championships. The aggravating thing is that we pay a mediocre person at his profession 28 million a year to fail at it most of the time. Maybe its just getting older or whatever but we value sports and entertainment way to highly as a society. Why are we not paying teachers or surgeons this much money? Society is *** backwards that's the most infuriating thing to me. So yeah it pisses me off that someone that literally exists to entertain me in my spare time is making more than other professions that should be more highly valued. Them arguing over an extra 2-3 million is a slap in the face and shows how petty the NFL actually is when it comes to money. Now, I'm not saying im not interested in the product, however the money is out of hand now.
Meh. It's escapism. The NFL brings in that money because it's what people pay for. You can be mad at the Players if you want, but then you need to direct as much or more at owners, which people generally don't. I find hatred towards players misplaced through misunderstanding.
Wow, good for him. Never really liked the guy, nor his practice habits, but he’s getting a nice chunk of change for his swan song. $10 million guaranteed, that’s wild given his chronic hip. I wonder how many games he’ll play...
San Diego has a strong recent tradition of offensive linemen being lost to injury. He'll fit right in. Adios, and I won't miss him at all. Really unlikable guy off the field, and unreliable on it.
The risks of career ending injuries are farrr greater in the NFL and thats why the NFL doesnt fully guarantee these contracts. Not defending them btw, i think there should be insurance on a player if they get an injury that prevents them from playing again. Much like college football has insurance on their players.
Similar in the UK with football/soccer, when you have kids of 19 getting contracts at £50k a week who are only reserves (and then they wonder why a lot of them don't progress, when they are made at that point & lose all of their desire to work. learn & progress). Some of the contracts are ridiculous but as has been said, they aren't going to turn down the contract (Man United have just signed a former Arsenal player and his contract is apparently £400K A WEEK after tax). Then they wonder why the older fan is getting disillusioned with the game - they are getting priced out.
That's on the owners though, not the players. The money is coming in already - from people like us directly, or indirectly via things like TV contracts and advertising. Even if players collectively decided to slash salaries by like 50% for whatever reason, the owners would still charge as much as possible because they treat it as a business and a money making venture. It's not player salaries that are inflating prices. Owners have little to no incentive to change things unless people stop going to games/buying merch/turning off the TV - make no mistake, they could absolutely charge less for tickets or concessions or parking, etc right now and still make money. If and when a league wide revenue decrease happens, player salary would naturally follow. Until that happens, players are right to fight for every dime they can get for what is a unique skillset and generally a lifetime of hard work put in. It's funny that the athletes so often get criticized for basically realizing the American Dream - work hard, possess a marketable skill and in a market with a high value and watch money flow in. But I guess because it's "entertainment" it doesn't count lol.
This may sound more contentious than I wish, I am genuinely curious though, do you have any evidence to back this up? While on first glance, common sense may lead us to believe this, I can easily see other sports (especially basketball) being worse. Those foot/back injuries on a 6'10+ body are brutal when your sport is all about jumping, leaping and elevating. Baseball pitchers can really get hammered too.
I agree from the outside looking in, it never made much sense. However, these players aren't suckers falling for the same con game year after year. They go in knowing how the contract works and exactly what the organization is on the hook for. While it doesn't make it as straight forward for the fans there really shouldn't be any surprises for the athlete after they sign. Like most legal contracts, the fine print details are whats important. Making the contracts complicated like this just helps keep lawyers and agents gainfully employed.
Basketball for the joints/tendons of big guys Baseball and Tennis gets the shoulder/arm injuries Boxing/MMA....we don't need details there Hockey...could be worse than boxing/MMA Golf seems relatively safe since there's no real pace I would guess hockey has the most injuries- the puck, the stick, the hard checks, the fighting...there's so many ways to get knocked out of commission. They're also moving faster than everyone else so collisions are naturally more brutal. I haven't been to a hockey game in years....now I want to go!
Yeah, i'm a big Chargers fan and Rivers fan as well. Obviously if they're playing Miami I want to them to lose, but easily a top five favorite team of mine. Glad Pouncey went there, I really didn't want us to let him go, but business is business. Hopefully he solidifies that San Diego line. Chargers are poised to have a good year next season. Young team with a great QB, Mike Williams healthy...Yeah, they will be dangerous.
Center Mike Pouncey moved quickly to sign with the Chargers after being released by the Dolphins...Pouncey’s explanation for that rapid decision centered on one of his new teammates. Pouncey mentioned the defense and the rest of the offensive line, but the first thing out of his mouth was “they have a great quarterback” and he wasn’t done talking about Philip Rivers. “No disrespect to any of the guys in Miami,” Pouncey said, via the team’s website. “I enjoyed my career there for seven years with the Miami Dolphins, but to be able to play with an elite guy like this and a Hall of Fame quarterback is something I always dreamed of in my life. I can’t wait. I’m so excited. … I’d tell my guys all the time about the time we played the Chargers a few years ago, and they called his name and he was high-kneeing it out of the tunnel. He had so much excitement I said, ‘That’s the kind of guy I want to be with.’ This is an opportunity of a lifetime and I couldn’t pass it up.” Pouncey played with four starting quarterbacks in Miami and it doesn’t feel disrespectful to point out that Rivers has a far different profile than Ryan Tannehill, Jay Cutler, Matt Moore and Chad Henne. Now we’ll find out if the change in quarterbacks helps get Pouncey to the playoffs for the second time in his career.
What??? a guy going to a new team begins to gush about new teammates... wow that never happens... except for literally every other time a guy goes to a new team...
Dispatched on a job this morning and the name of the customer was Pouncey. Nice older man and he had a lot of Dolphins garb around his house. Come to find out, he’s Mike Pouncey’s uncle. Just thought it was pretty neat
Rivers in the HOF? Color me meh. He's Eli without the Super Bowls and signature moments. He's in the Hall of Very Good, not Fame.
I don't think you're giving Rivers enough credit. He's insanely good and if he retired today he'd be in the HoF in 5 years.
Disagree, unless your putting him in based on reliability and longevity.. his numbers are a culmination of those traits..
Meh. He's got some nice stats, but so do lots of people. He's a longer tenured Tony Romo. At a glance, ahead of him Id have Peyton, Brady, Rogers, Brees, Eli, Big Ben. Rivers is a very good, elite QB, but HOF to me, nah. But I don't have a vote so whatever.
I read a long article about this today and it essentially said that San Fran reached out late one night offering to trade Kilgore to us. The 49ers were working with him to get him to a team-friendly city where he wanted to go, and Miami was one of Kilgore's first choices. So Tannenbaum called Gase and they debated it....Gase didn't like the idea at all to start with. However, Gase also had a medical report saying that Pouncey was going to be limited by pain management- his hips were going to hurt regardless. That's why he only practiced 1-2 days a week throughout the season, and they felt it hurt the chemistry some. Also, Gase said he was partially to blame for what he was asking Pouncey to do in run blocking...he admitted that it may not have been possible for anyone to pull it off consistently. They still felt that Pouncey was an elite pass blocker and a darn good run blocker, so they were committed to keeping him. He was also one of Gase's favorite players and it was stated that he was never a problem in the locker room- all the culture stuff was complete BS by the media. Pouncey was clearly a leader. With Kilgore though, they would get better run blocking and slightly worse pass blocking- although Kilgore never let Jimmy G take a single hit. They would have Kilgore every day for practice though and that's ultimately what made them make the move- it wasn't about culture, salary or even talent. Honestly, it sounds like they still feel Pouncey is the better overall lineman and Gase is still upset by the move. He said that there was nothing more Pouncey could have given the team in energy, effort or leadership. So at best, Kilgore is a lateral move that saves money and adds a different type of leader to the offensive line. Whether this was a good/bad move really comes down to chemistry with the new linemen and their practices together. I think overall this will work in our favor but like Gase, I'm not thrilled with parting ways with Pouncey. Oh, one more tidbit- they announced cutting Pouncey before signing Kilgore, but it actually happened in the reverse order. They figured that Kilgore would start due to health and they offered Pouncey less money to be a backup (or maybe even our right guard). He said no and then they cut him basically on a mutual agreement. Pouncey was devastated though because he felt he did everything right (and he did).
Some of the media was saying that last week...or saying that "he could have been a culture cut". Gase clearly said that wasn't the case though.
Was it this one? http://www.miamiherald.com/sports/spt-columns-blogs/armando-salguero/article207773249.html
One little thing from the article is that Kilgore is a gym rat while Pouncey wasn’t dedicated to the gym. It’s one of the little nagging things, like the revalations about his party habits in the JMartin kerfuffle, that made me worry about whether he put in enough work to protect his body. I think the article makes a lot of sense and fits the publicly known facts. I can see Landry and Suh being culture cuts. Personally I would have made Pouncey a culture cut, but Adam Gase has been consistent in praising Pouncey’s effort and leadership. I don’t get why the Dolphins asked Pouncey to take a pay cut to goad him into asking for a release. I think there must have been a classier way to handle the situation.
I have a feeling it was Gase fighting for him and the front office doing a roundabout to avoid firing him. That's just the impression I got though; I don't have anything to back that up.
I suppose that makes sense, but I really don’t like that kind of shenanigans. It strikes me of a very short sighted way of dealing with people. In the NFL they aren’t carnies making a living by fleecing one time visitors, they have to do repeat business with the agents the pool of NFL players.