Per Jason La Canfora's Redskins Insider:
Spoke with Mark Brunell today and got the impression a new, cap-friendly contract with the Skins will be done in a few days. He seems pumped to have a chance to come back.
Also, the Skins told Frosty today that he will be tendered - the low tender ($850,000) - which secures his rights and essentially means he'll be back next season to try to build off his strong finish in 2006.
Derrick Frost first. I think this is good news; he started off poorly enough to draw my ire but finished well and firmly established himself on the team. I still think there could be competitions, though I'm confident that Frost would win out.
Regarding Brunell, if JaLa is right this would blow away both what I predicted and what I wanted. Beating a dead horse here, but I believe Mark Brunell's contract is far too high for us to pay, either in base salary or prorated bonuses. I think it's crazy, insane, and a totally irresponsible use of cap space.
Now for my apologist bit. Mark Brunell is an excellent backup. He knows the offense, he's won games, and per Jason Campbell he has been an excellent mentor. Is he worth the money? No additional comment.
Canfora is also selling shirts and the proceeds will go to some kind of charity venture. I'm thinking about getting a Super-Smart long sleeve in honor of that same phrase so familiar to Redskins fans courtesy of Coach Gibbs.
Update [2007-2-27 10:6:6 by Skin Patrol]: Piling it on per the Post:
The Washington Redskins have made progress in contract negotiations with quarterback Mark Brunell and could complete a restructured deal in the coming days. Brunell, who lost his starting job to Jason Campbell last season and is recovering from shoulder surgery, said he hopes to be with Washington for a fourth season. "I'm optimistic about getting a deal done," Brunell said... In such a deal, Brunell, 36, likely would end up with a considerably lower cap figure, with a portion of his salary converted into a bonus, and a base salary closer to $1 million.
Mathlete time. 5.2M base salary -> 1M base salary means 4.2M must be converted into bonus. The absolute ideal (and I don't know if this is possible) situation is that more than 1$ of that is converted to roster bonuses which we might not have to pay. Again, I don't know if that's possible. More likely we've just turned 4.2M of Brunell's salary -- that he couldn't possibly have earned as an ageing backup anyways -- into 4.2M that we will pay against our salary cap
no matter what. I just don't get it.
