Except they are not.
The signing bonuses are "bonuses" and the base salary is "salary"
We cant just change the definitions of words to fit our agendas.
A player under a 4-year contract can not go negotiate a higher contract with another team, because he is under contract.
A team can negotiate with a player's potential replacement and then cut him at any time under that 4-year deal, and the player is not owed anything (unless they had guaranteed money left).
The player is expected to "honor" his contract, even if he feels (rightly or wrongly) he has outperformed the original deal.
The team does not have to "honor" the contract if they feel the player has under-performed the original deal.
You don't really have this issue in the NBA or MLB because player contracts are guaranteed, and MLB uses an independent arbitrator to make rulings on players thinking they deserve more money.
Honest ( no B.S. ) question I'd like to get your esteemed & valued take on,as I'm of the understanding you are heavily involved in this, our passion, the game of Football& I possibly recall your mentioning as to being a COACH of the game in some capacity?
Well,Chris, reading your above post ( that I pulled the quote on) really got me to pondering as to just what
YOU would consider to be the viable ,
negative monetary impacted cost breakdown per fumble,Interception ,sack for loss(q.b.) or tackled for loss? (r.b.) say for either position that a player is contracted to fulfill at
( ,,,er,,, for E-Z math purposes) say, a cool 20 million dollars per season? What amount
( if any) would you deem equitable per them doing
( not what the agreed upon $20 mil) that their receiving in good faith for be leveled at? ,a $100 thou per interception? A 1/4 mil per fumble?,,,as it was the very reading of your post the spawned this (albeit) abstract question.