Contract negotiations between the Seattle Seahawks and quarterback Russell Wilson continue to fester.
It has already been reported that Wilson wants a deal somewhere in the vicinity of $20 million per season, while Seahawks GM John Schneider is said to be uninterested in forking over that much cash, even for a player of Wilson's ilk.
The latest twist to the Wilson-Seahawks saga comes in the form of former Wilson agent, Bus Cook. While Cook no longer represents Wilson, he does represent Chicago Bears quarterback Jay Cutler and was directly responsible for Cutler's new seven-year, $126.7 million contract, which came with $54 million in guarantees, signed just prior to the 2014 season.
Per a recent report, Wilson will look to the Cutler deal as a general template for his own contract.
"That is the starting point, basically, for where Wilson wants to be and there is a reason for that," Jason Cole of Bleacher Report said. "Although Cook and Wilson parted amicably - Wilson decided he wanted to go with Mark Rodgers, his former baseball agent who became certified as a football agent and left Cook as a result of that - upon leaving, Cook pushed Wilson very hard to say, 'Do not take the Colin Kaepernick deal, do not take the Andy Dalton deal.' In other words, get at least the Jay Cutler deal."
Kaepernick and Dalton both signed new deals, with the San Francisco 49ers and Cincinnati Bengals respectively, which carry inflated overall numbers but which actually have little in the way of guaranteed figures and are driven almost exclusively by incentives.
Kaepernick specifically signed a seven-year, $126 million deal which, on the surface, looks much like Cutler's, but in reality could end up paying Kaepernick as little as $25.9 million and allows the team to part with him, for no cost, after 2015.
"After leading the Seahawks to back-to-back Super Bowls, the starting point for Wilson is viewed as at least Jay Cutler, rather than the year-to-year guarantees that follow in the Dalton and Kaepernick deals," Cole said.
Interestingly, beyond just seeking value commensurate to his production and perceived worth, Wilson's contract negotiations and the efforts of Rodgers are also being watched closely by the NFLPA who, per Cole, came close to decertifying the agent for Kaepernick after the real numbers of his deal were reported.
"That is why Wilson's deal is so important for the players going forward."
With the NFLPA's backing, it seems extremely unlikely Wilson will be willing to take anything other than maximum value home from talks with Seattle.
