Joe Flacco-Baltimore Ravens
Joe Flacco: Super Bowl MVP, Playoffs all 5 years in his career, 3 AFC Championships
Joe Flacco entered the 2012-2013 NFL season in a contract year. Before the season began contract talks faltered. As agent Joe Linta discussed throughout the season with Owner Steve Biscotti, Joe just kept performing. To say the least, Joe placed a hefty bet on himself and it payed off big time. Come Friday night, Joe Flacco's groundbreaking contract details were released. Flacco became the highest payed player in NFL history earning 126 million dollars over the course of 6 years.
With Joe's contract being released, 2 major issues came about; Is Joe Flacco the best player in NFL history and Doesn't this hurt the Ravens when they have so many key free agents.
To answer the first, obviously Joe isn't the greatest player in the history of the game but timing is everything. The fact that Joe won a Super Bowl in his contract year in the year 2013 just happened to earn him this contract. Joe ranks 5th in the league just at his position behind Manning, Brees, Rodgers, and Brady but he got the job done when it had to be done.
The next question, Will this hurt Baltimore?While Joe is going to be a heavy contract on the already tight Raven's budget, signing Flacco will actually relieve some pressure on the Super Bowl Champs. If the two sides hadn't agreed to a contract, Baltimore would have had to utilize the tag, costing them up to 14 million dollars this season. From my research, The Baltimore Sun notes that Flacco's deal will have about a $7 million dollar hit on the cap as opposed to the potential 14 million. With Flacco saving the team about $7 million combined with the retirements of Ray Lewis and Matt Birk, Baltimore will be saving about $15 million dollars to retain key free agents like Paul Kruger, Cary Williams, Anquan Boldin, and Dannell Ellerbe.
Mike Trout- Los Angeles Angels
Shifting gears to Baseball, during this past week, Los Angeles Angels-Center Fielder, Mike Trout, decided to renew his contract at only $20,000 above the league minimum of $4900,000. The reigning Rookie of the Year obviously could have chosen to renegotiate a contract more fitting to his performance but chose to take "the high road". While his agent, Craig Landis, was not happy about Trout's decision, it is a respectable one coming from the 2nd year player. These are the players that should be most respected in sports today. They are putting the team's needs before themselves. LAA took on Albert Pujols, the highest paid player in the league, and then added Josh Hamilton's monster contract in the offseason. I'm not sure exactly what the Angels plan to do when Trout comes for his money but for now, much respect goes to Mike Trout.
LeBron James-Miami HeatEveryone by now should be aware that the Heat are blazing. Miami has won their 14th straight with a come from behind win over the Knicks on Sunday. But the bigger news this week has been about LeBron's pre-game dunking routine. James has shown off his high-flying skills with an impressive dunk throughout this great win streak. So great are LeBron's dunks that Hall of Famer, Magic Johnson, has put a bounty on LeBron. The Bounty states that if James participates in the Dunk Contest, the winner of the Contest will be awarded $1,000,000. Yes 1 million dollars. While this is clearly a bribe to get James into the contest, I see it as a positive motivation. Assuming LeBron wins the contest, James would then have the chance to donate the money to his charity the LeBron James Family Foundation. James has had the critics out on him for a while since he's left Cleveland and I see no greater opportunity for LeBron to make his image crystal clear. For the aforementioned reasons, I do believe James will participate in the 2014 contest and add an iconic dunk to his ever lasting legacy.
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