Willis Value

[ThunderDan]

I see. If we pull it off, there is no impact, right? But the tag itself has a cap cost once he signs it, until he is traded? And to your point, he'd need an attractive enough offer to justify not taking the one year deal

I am sure Willis agent will want a signing bonus and guaranteed money.

[pbmax]

I see. If we pull it off, there is no impact, right? But the tag itself has a cap cost once he signs it, until he is traded? And to your point, he'd need an attractive enough offer to justify not taking the one year deal

I am sure Willis agent will want a signing bonus and guaranteed money.

Yes, even the transition tag costs $35 million against the cap immediately. If he signs it the Packers would have days to start cutting people and they are already shy of the 51 offseason cap roster number.

So they would need an immediate deal from them without leverage.

The only way it happens is if the other team wants Willis so badly compared to other choices that they reach an agreement on a deal that is low signing bonus early, low first year cap hit and are willing to trade something to guarantee a sort of exclusive negotiating window.

But Willis has no incentive to make that happen unless someone blows them away with an offer. Which makes fitting it into the Packers cap even tighter. And the Packers would be running a huge risk until the trade is official.

The other teams also don't like to put themselves into positions like this either as it just increases costs.

[sharpe1027]

According to some, we should be able to sign the best free agents in the market each year AND never lose a player to another team for salary reasons if we are just willing to pay. No consequences. It's a joke of a theory that doesn't comport to reality.

We should have brought in Josh Sweat and Milton Williams to improve our DL. While at it, why didn't we bring in Paulson Adebo and Carlton Bynum when we all knew the DBs were questionable?

The NFL isn't like baseball where certain teams load up on the best players by out spending other teams by 3X
This is only because of the salary cap.

There's no such thing as cooking the cap. There's some flexibility in controlling the timing of when money paid to a player counts with a few pretty well understood mechanisms. If you think the salary cap isn't real, your bad at math, too lazy to figure out how it works, or both.

[NewsBruin]

According to some, we should be able to sign the best free agents in the market each year AND never lose a player to another team for salary reasons if we are just willing to pay. No consequences. It's a joke of a theory that doesn't comport to reality..

That's silly. It would then be the case for every team, but you're forgetting the other half of the equation: All the good players are Packer People, who want to sign for a Hometown Discount or a Prove-It Deal.

[bobblehead]

You’re 100% correct.
Bakh was a bad decision from the start, and others were kept too long.
I think the decision-makers are too often wringing their hands about getting rid of players early.
They are like “How will we replace them?”

Speaking of which, they should have also traded Rodgers a year earlier.

And they should have traded Rasheed Walker in camp when Morgan showed he could handle starters in back to back games. Sadly in the "not for long" league GMs have no incentive to think past this year. Packers GM should be the one job that has that luxury. Howie Rosenstein of the Eagles was given a longer term timeline to build a roster because of his closeness to the owner and he did a stellar job of tearing it down and building for the long term. Bellicheat did the same constantly trading his picks for multiple picks in the next years draft that snowballed into long term success....but the smartest move 'cheat ever made was not insisting that "there is no QB controversy, Drew Bledsoe, former first overall pick, is our starting QB!!"

[bobblehead]

I see. If we pull it off, there is no impact, right? But the tag itself has a cap cost once he signs it, until he is traded? And to your point, he'd need an attractive enough offer to justify not taking the one year deal

You can't tag him without freeing up the cap space. If I'm willis and you tag me I instant sign for about $45 million fully guaranteed.

[falco]

You can't tag him without freeing up the cap space. If I'm willis and you tag me I instant sign for about $45 million fully guaranteed.

Right - but isn't there also a scenario where a team offers him a 4-5 year deal with something more guaranteed that beats the risk of sitting on the bench behind Love for another year? Odds are his market value is the highest it will be at that moment.

[falco]

Yes, even the transition tag costs $35 million against the cap immediately. If he signs it the Packers would have days to start cutting people and they are already shy of the 51 offseason cap roster number.

So they would need an immediate deal from them without leverage.

The only way it happens is if the other team wants Willis so badly compared to other choices that they reach an agreement on a deal that is low signing bonus early, low first year cap hit and are willing to trade something to guarantee a sort of exclusive negotiating window.

But Willis has no incentive to make that happen unless someone blows them away with an offer. Which makes fitting it into the Packers cap even tighter. And the Packers would be running a huge risk until the trade is official.

The other teams also don't like to put themselves into positions like this either as it just increases costs.

Makes sense. What an unfortunate way to have Willis depart...

[bobblehead]

Right - but isn't there also a scenario where a team offers him a 4-5 year deal with something more guaranteed that beats the risk of sitting on the bench behind Love for another year? Odds are his market value is the highest it will be at that moment.

Doubtful imo. Personally I think the packers should work really hard between the last game and the start of FA to get Willis to sing a deal comparable to what he is likely to get in FA. Then work the phones to trade Love. That won't happen unless Gutes is fired and replaced on day 1 AND its what Policy wants. But even if you sign him for said deal then trade him for a 3rd you accelerate when that pick is received by a year and remove the risk of the NFL fucking us as usual by giving us a 4th or 5th instead.

[NewsBruin]

Re-signing Willis purely for trading sounds like wishful thinking, because any signing bonus gets taken from our 2026 salary cap once we cut or trade him. Why would Willis sign an extension with a low or no signing bonus on the assurance that his Real 2026 Team will make him a competitive offer? Just cut out the maneuvering and be a free-agen QB with all the wining and dining and stupid signing-bonus offers from thirsty teams trying to out-think each other.

I've seen recent trades (like Rodgers to the Jets) use some convoluted lifting to have the receiving team cover guaranteed money and bonuses, but those mechanisms never get explained.

If some nimrod like me has picked up on the need to extend Willis midway through this season, surely the Packers didn't say, "Oh, crap, it's the last week of the season, and we never got around to Willis last season. We probably ought to do something before the pregame walkthrough." I guess Willis, his agent, and the Packers decided not to go for a high backup-level extension to a Top-3 cost QB if Willis had visions of proving his startability while on our team.

Even if he walks, it was a pretty good return on a 7th-round pick.

[texaspackerbacker]

A lot of times I don't agree with bobblehead, but he got it right that we could and should re-sign Willis for about what he'd get in free agency elsewhere. Bruin is also right, that then trading him would negate the cap benefit of a fairly large signing bonus. If we could come out of it with a first rounder in trade, that might be worth it, but for the 3rd, 4th, or 5th rounders bobblehead talked about, it would no. What really ought to be done, and I think slightly over 50% chance will be done is to sign Willis and retain him along with Love. I really doubt we'd need to sacrifice much elsewhere on the team to do that, but even if that did happen, having a high quality backup QB would be worth it. LaFleur also could and should put in a few packages to use Wilis' mobility, etc. Signing Desmond Ridder might make retention of Willis a little bit less necessary, depending on how good Ridder is deemed to be, as he undoubtedly would be a lot cheaper.

[Bretsky]

Doubtful imo. Personally I think the packers should work really hard between the last game and the start of FA to get Willis to sing a deal comparable to what he is likely to get in FA. Then work the phones to trade Love. That won't happen unless Gutes is fired and replaced on day 1 AND its what Policy wants. But even if you sign him for said deal then trade him for a 3rd you accelerate when that pick is received by a year and remove the risk of the NFL fucking us as usual by giving us a 4th or 5th instead.

I would be ok with this

[NewsBruin]

I think the best thing the Packers should do is at the year-end team meeting, invite Willis up to the front, shake his hand, thank him for his contributions, and present him with the Mark Brunell-Aaron Brooks Underrated Quarterback Prospect Whose Development Flourished To Its True Potential Under The Packers Family Legacy Medallion and ask him to wear it with pride wherever he goes, as a reminder of the love and support he received in his years as a Packer, specifically to all offensive installations and QB meetings, to always face the coach, ask lots of questions, and not eat from anything with a crinkly bag. Oh, and to remember to charge it up at night.

[sharpe1027]

Doubtful imo. Personally I think the packers should work really hard between the last game and the start of FA to get Willis to sing a deal comparable to what he is likely to get in FA. Then work the phones to trade Love. That won't happen unless Gutes is fired and replaced on day 1 AND its what Policy wants. But even if you sign him for said deal then trade him for a 3rd you accelerate when that pick is received by a year and remove the risk of the NFL fucking us as usual by giving us a 4th or 5th instead.

If they trade Love, they have a HUGE cap hit, and it only gets worse over the next several years.

[ThunderDan]

If they trade Love, they have a HUGE cap hit, and it only gets worse over the next several years.

Trading Love costs $14,000,000 in a cap hit for 2026. We have to eat the remaining $50,000,000 in signing bonus but don’t have to pay his $36,000,000 in salary for 2026.