DMN: Writer calls Dan Bailey's new deal 'Worst Contract of the Year'

[Super_Kazuya]

First of all, I am perfectly fine with signing Bailey. Jerry will find a way to give the money to someone even more undeserving if he didn't give it to Dan. Bailey is one of our guys, he started with us, and I like cheering for guys like that. So I'm fine. Having said that...

The criticism of the deal is perfectly valid regardless of if you want to hear it or not. The kicker is by far the most disposable position on the roster. There is no such thing as an elite kicker when every kicker in the entire league basically makes every kick. Bailey could kick the ball just as well as last year and miss 5 or 6 kicks due to the well-documented volatility of the position. And he will have some seasons like that. Gostkowski has missed 5 FGs in a season twice and 6 FGs in a season twice. Gould has missed 5 twice and 6 once. So you can be pretty sure Bailey will too. He will also probably continue to have his share of good seasons and make field goals at a similar rate to what he did last year... and still be nothing special.

I don't think some people are quite getting it when people are saying the differences between kickers are really small. Again, it is only a slight exaggeration to say that every kicker in the league makes just about every kick. The entire league made 87% of field goals attempted last year. The entire league. If the entire league was a player, that performance would rank 4th all-time in Career field goal accuracy. Repeated:

If the entire league was a player, the 2013 league-wide performance would rank 4th all-time in the history of the NFL for Career field goal accuracy.

There is nothing special about any kicker in the NFL.

 

[Nightman]

First of all, I am perfectly fine with signing Bailey. Jerry will find a way to give the money to someone even more undeserving if he didn't give it to Dan. Bailey is one of our guys, he started with us, and I like cheering for guys like that. So I'm fine. Having said that...

The criticism of the deal is perfectly valid regardless of if you want to hear it or not. The kicker is by far the most disposable position on the roster. There is no such thing as an elite kicker when every kicker in the entire league basically makes every kick. Bailey could kick the ball just as well as last year and miss 5 or 6 kicks due to the well-documented volatility of the position. And he will have some seasons like that. Gostkowski has missed 5 FGs in a season twice and 6 FGs in a season twice. Gould has missed 5 twice and 6 once. So you can be pretty sure Bailey will too. He will also probably continue to have his share of good seasons and make field goals at a similar rate to what he did last year... and still be nothing special.

I don't think some people are quite getting it when people are saying the differences between kickers are really small. Again, it is only a slight exaggeration to say that every kicker in the league makes just about every kick. The entire league made 87% of field goals attempted last year. The entire league. If the entire league was a player, that performance would rank 4th all-time in Career field goal accuracy. Repeated:

If the entire league was a player, the 2013 league-wide performance would rank 4th all-time in the history of the NFL for Career field goal accuracy.

There is nothing special about any kicker in the NFL.

That is a huge over simplification. The Saints basically lost because their off the street veteran Kicker missed 2 Fgs. Graham was signed with a week left in the season because Hartley only made 73% of his kicks. Graham has been on 7 teams since 2009, so he has to be considered the best of the rest. He is 36 years old and has an 85% career record. The other route is to hope to get lucky again in the draft or with an UDFA. Why take the chance? That makes little to no sense. And don't blame the cap, they can easily be 15m under the cap with a few restructures and a few cuts. And to top it off, Bailey's cap hit with still be 12th in the league next year before anyone else get signed. To me, it's complaining for the sake of complaining, which is all that is done around here.

There is no reason to let a kicker hitting 90+% and 6-7 from 50+yds because of an extra million or two. By the time his contract is up he will still be less than 2% of the cap.

 

[big dog cowboy]

The NFL offseason has not officially started and Bill Baldwin has already identified the worst contract made this year.

Only 1 piece of criteria needed - the bottom line has Jerry Jones name on it

 

[CyberB0b]

I would probably hate the contract if he were older, but I think it's fine. Good kickers usually last 10+ years.