Wagner's pricetag keeps going up

1st Team All Pro!?!?

Deservedly so, love Wagner and everything he brings to our defense. Now I'm starting to worry about Russ and Wagner both getting new deals soon. Trust Pete and John but hope on everything that we can resign BOTH these guys.

Can we afford to give out one of the biggest QB contracts and biggest MLB contract this year? Didn't we just give the biggest CB and FS contract? I don't know the salary cap details and rumor has the salary cap going up a good amount so maybe it's all possible. But man, Russ and Wagner leading us to back to back superbowls is going to raise them both even higher...

Can we afford both of them at top dollar? What a top MLB making these days? The top linebackers are making between 7-9M a year with Orakpo being the outlier at 11.4M but those all tend to be 3-4 linebackers so I would guess Wagner will make 7-8M? Maybe less.

You can franchise tag a LB easier than a QB

Orakpo is making 11.4M but he is an extreme outlier, most others seem to be in the 7-9M range but even that isn't a good guide to what Wagner will make because they all tend to be linebackers playing in a true 3-4 alignment. So who knows if he will get that kind of money or slightly less say 6-7M? I could see it going either way but don't expect more then 9M at worst.

We still have Wagz for another year. Maybe we let him stay healthy next year and redding him towards the end of the season like we did with KJ and Avril.

I'm confident they will be able to resign both players this offseason. Don't forget that the deals that Avril and Wright got basically took the place of Harvin's contract. With the cap going up another 10million or so this coming year they should easily be able to work out deals for both guys.

I'm a huge Wagner fan, my only slight concern is that over the last 2 years he's missed roughly 8 games. Hopefully he can be more sturdy going forward. We don't want him to break down physically like Lofa Tatupu did.

I really don't think that they throw the money they did at Wright and Avril without having a very reasonable amount earmarked for Wagner. I'm still not worried about losing him.

I hear a lot of people on here point out that the salary cap is going up therefore we can afford to keep more high price players.

Isn't the salary cap going up for every team? Wouldn't the net effect of that be players salaries go up as a result. If every team has more money available to bring in top talent, the salaries will go up accordingly and the net effect will be the same- it will be tough to keep too many top talent players around. I don't think the salary cap increasing will help us retain more free agent players. Salaries will go up accordingly and we will end up paying more- supply and demand.

It depends on what they signed on the bottom line for. Old contracts still apply. I think any way. I believe I read where if the money coming in goes up, the players contracts still apply for what they signed for. Go Hawks.

idahawks":1ob52kib said:

I hear a lot of people on here point out that the salary cap is going up therefore we can afford to keep more high price players.

Isn't the salary cap going up for every team? Wouldn't the net effect of that be players salaries go up as a result. If every team has more money available to bring in top talent, the salaries will go up accordingly and the net effect will be the same- it will be tough to keep too many top talent players around. I don't think the salary cap increasing will help us retain more free agent players. Salaries will go up accordingly and we will end up paying more- supply and demand.

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That's IF they hit the street. Your point is irrelevant if they lock them up before they hit free agency. Both Wagner and Wilson are under contract for 2015. So if they both get signed this coming offseason that prevents them from testing the free agent market. It gives Seattle more cap room allowing them to try to lock up guys before they become free agents.

Now that Chancellor, Thomas, Sherman, Wright, Bennett and Avril have multi-year deals, I doubt well make any significant offers to free agents. Maybe a guy on a 1-2 year deal @ DT or something. I would expect the majority of the draft picks to be on the offensive side of the ball.

Seahawkfan80":1ypfk434 said:

It depends on what they signed on the bottom line for. Old contracts still apply. I think any way. I believe I read where if the money coming in goes up, the players contracts still apply for what they signed for. Go Hawks.

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I would guess all existing contracts do not change. But every team will have an extra 10 million to spend on free agents so the price for all subsequent contracts will go up. Hence Seattle won't be able to retain any more free agents because every team will have extra money to drive the price up.

I am looking at Wilson being 17-21 million per. Largely guaranteed. Those looking at Russ costing 22-25 mil per just are not looking at things as they are throughout the league. He's worth twice that to us, to be honest. His deal will be longer than what we've been seeing, and as team-friendly as it possibly can be.

Wags may have to wait until a year from now, where we take of him like we just did KJ and Avril. His number will probably be around 8 mil for 5 years.

It'd be lovely to see Wilson signed at 17M (likely no but lovely). I expect it to be at that 21M number especially if he helps with winning us another Superbowl. Also I see no good reason to not sign Wagner this year if he's been designated as a core player. Take advantage of the extra year to make that contract even more team friendly because you can.

Wagner's price is going up, but so are the salary cap projections.

Lock him up as soon as our season's over, I'm thinking something like 4 years at $34m, which would be more like 5 for $35m with him under contract in 2015.

The advantage is he still has another year on his rookie deal. Hawks can say sure play another season at 500k or 5 million.

Who knew keeping together a team of all-stars would be so expensive?

idahawks":1zc9rpcj said:

Seahawkfan80":1zc9rpcj said:

It depends on what they signed on the bottom line for. Old contracts still apply. I think any way. I believe I read where if the money coming in goes up, the players contracts still apply for what they signed for. Go Hawks.

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I would guess all existing contracts do not change. But every team will have an extra 10 million to spend on free agents so the price for all subsequent contracts will go up. Hence Seattle won't be able to retain any more free agents because every team will have extra money to drive the price up.

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Agreed and the competition for those that want/feel the need to test the waters will either help them or hurt them depending on their play and how they have helped the Team they are on. It will be an interesting offseason. I almost expected them to pen Waggies extension this past week..and it may happen within this coming week. We wont know until it happens. I dont expect the other MAJOR signing until about April or May. Just MY guess tho.

idahawks":1nlxx1fa said:

I would guess all existing contracts do not change. But every team will have an extra 10 million to spend on free agents so the price for all subsequent contracts will go up. Hence Seattle won't be able to retain any more free agents because every team will have extra money to drive the price up.

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You are right in the long run; if the salary goes up by 10% then all contracts go up by 10% and the players are the only ones who are better off as a result. The wrinkle is that most players have existing contracts and so allocations will be inefficient in the short run in favor of the teams. The UFAs this season will make 10% more but there will be money left over that will be spent towards renegotiating existing contracts or rolled over until those come up. This extra money is coming from players on existing contracts who are now being underpaid.

You're a fool if you don't think they're not already brainstorming and planning Wagner and Wilsons contract. Nobody said it'd be easy locking up a top 3 MLB.

Steve2222":qggpp8dp said:

You're a fool if you don't think they're not already brainstorming and planning Wagner and Wilsons contract. Nobody said it'd be easy locking up a top 3 MLB.

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I'm guessing they wrote up Russ' contract offer months ago but he's been too busy watching film to look at it.