NFL teams have made their decisions about using the franchise tag on their players, and only a handful have chosen to do so.
No worries, Steelers and Redskins fans: Le’Veon Bell and Kirk Cousins aren’t going anywhere. A handful of defensive stars on other teams probably aren’t either thanks to their designation as franchise players.
The official list of players given the franchise tag was released today, with no real surprises. Ian Rapoport of NFL Network and NFL.com was among the first to show off the full group of seven:
The official franchise tagged players are out, as are the figures. There are 7 of them pic.twitter.com/vZSPi7jBdo
— Ian Rapoport (@RapSheet) March 1, 2017
Two things jump out from that tweet. The first is that Bell and Cousins were given the exclusive franchise tag, meaning they can’t negotiate with other teams. Their clubs must offer them a one-year contract at the average of the top five players at their position for 2017 or 120 percent of their 2016 salary, whichever is greater. That’s not necessarily a bad deal for the Steelers since Bell is one of the top running backs in the NFL. For Cousins, it’s a little riskier, though teams can and often do use the tag as leverage to sign players to longer deals.
The other five players carrying the non-exclusive tag are due one-year contracts that average the top five cap hits at their position for 2017. Rapoport lays out those figures in the tweet, meaning Jason Pierre-Paul is the winner of that group with $16.9 million headed his way.
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Pierre-Paul is also a rarity in that he was given the non-exclusive franchise tag just two seasons ago by the Giants. While he and the others with that designation can negotiate with other teams, their current squads have the right to match and receive two first-round picks if the players leave, so it effectively means all seven franchise players should be staying put for this fall.