A Good Move, A Bad Move, and a Risky Move

It's NFL off-season time. More specifically, it's NFL franchising time. Before free agency begins at 12:01 AM on February 27th, teams across the league have been slapping the franchise tag on some of their best players. For those of you unfamiliar, placing the franchise tag on a player means:

1. The player gets a one year deal, valued at the average of the top 5 paid players at his position.

2. The player is forced to accept the deal.

3. Each team can only use one franchise deal per year.

4. If a player gets franchised two years in a row, his salary for the second year will be valued at 120% of his value the first year.

5. A player can not be franchised more than two years in a row. 

Players typically don't like it because they want long-term deals with fat signing bonuses at the beginning of them. Here's a look at three players who have recently had the franchise tag placed on them by their respective teams:

Darren Sproles - RB - San Diego Chargers - $6.62 million in 2009

For Sproles: Scary Move ...  Sproles knows now that he is "the guy" in San Diego - at least for one year. He is still sort of an unknown commodity; if you remember, he really only came on at the end of last season into the playoffs. Even if he plays well this year, his contract now won't increase, and unless his production is off-the-charts, his pay will likely decrease after this year. 

For Chargers: Bad Move ... I understand wanting to keep Sproles around, especially with the uncertainty surrounding LaDainian Tomlinson and his future in San Diego. Simply put, though, they overpaid him. These small, speedster-type guys are often injury-prone, and teams can scheme against him. Despite what we saw in the playoffs, I am very comfortable in telling you that Darren Sproles is not the third best running back in the NFL. 

Terrell Suggs - DE/LB - Baltimore Ravens - $10.20 million in 2009

For Suggs: Good Move ... Why wouldn't this be a good move for Suggs? Not only is he getting paid off the charts because of the 120% rule, but it guarantees that he is going to be given a long-term deal after this year. Even if he gets injured, he is completely proven. Every single team in the NFL would want to pay Terrell Suggs.

For Ravens: Good Move ... They may be overpaying him slightly, but it's a good move for the Ravens because it got Suggs out of the way. They can now focus their time and energy to resigning Ray Lewis and Jason Brown to multi-year deals. 

Matt Cassel - QB - New England Patriots - $14.65 million in 2009

For Cassel: Bad Move ... When the Patriots did this, they guaranteed Cassel that one of two things were going to happen. He now knows he either going to be traded before the season begins, or he's going to be Tom Brady's backup again in New England this year. Even if the latter is true, he knows he will be signing a long-term deal next year with someone. All this did for Cassel was put off the inevitable. 

For Patriots: Good Move ... They guaranteed themselves Cassel if Brady is not ready to start the season. It'll be a great move if they're sure Brady will be ready to go. Then, they can dump Cassel and his high number on some other team, and pick up boat-loads of draft picks so they can start a new dynasty. Leave it to New England.