*** DOLPHINS NEWS ***
Apr 15, 1998: -- Chester McGlockton may get an Offer --
The Miami Herald and the Sun-Sentinel are both reporting this
morning that the Dolphins are interested in signing Oakland defensive
tackle Chester McGlockton now that Oakland has refused to guarantee
his franchise tag. The Herald is further reporting that Dolphins'
Director of Football Operations Bob Ackles "spent Tuesday afternoon
negotiating with the player's agent in hopes of signing him to an
offer sheet before Thursday."
According to a deal reached earlier this week between the NFL
and the players association, all teams that have a franchise player
designated must have guaranteed that player's contract by 4 PM
yesterday or that player became what amounts to a restricted free
agent.
It's a special situation that needs some explaining.
Basically, if a team guaranteed a player's salary yesterday, they
retained the franchise rights to that player and everything that goes
with it. If they chose not to guarantee the salary, then the
compensation price for that player went way down.
In McGlockton's case, if any team can sign him to an offer
sheet, the Raiders will have 24 hours to match that offer. If the
Raiders don't match, then the team signing McGlockton must give up
some compensation, but that compensation will be much lower than the 2
first round draft picks that they would have had to give up if
McGlockton had stayed the Raiders' guaranteed franchise player.
The compensation that the signing team will have to give up
depends on when McGlockton signs the offer sheet. If he signs it
before midnight tomorrow, then the signing team will have to give up a
2nd round pick in this year's draft to the Raiders. If McGlockton
doesn't sign with anyone before tomorrow at midnight, then the signing
team must give up a 1st and a 3rd round pick in the 1999 draft to the
Raiders.
Obviously, it's to the signing team's advantage to get a deal
done before tomorrow night.
Other teams that might be in the running for McGlockton are
reported to be Kansas City, Jacksonville and Denver.
In other related news, the Dolphins did guarantee the
franchise tag that they placed on Tim Bowens, meaning that they must
pay him at least the $2.88 million average price of last year's 5
highest paid defensive tackles in the NFL.
The Dolphins continue to insist that they won't try and sign
Bowens to a contract before July 15th, because they want to make their
franchise tag available next year. If they sign Bowens before July
15th, Bowens will keep the franchise tag for the length of his
contract. If they don't sign him until after July 15th, the Dolphins
can take back the franchise tag and use it on someone else next year.
My Comments:
If the Dolphins can sign McGlockton, they would gain one of
the better defensive tackles in the league. However, his signing
would put the future of Tim Bowens in doubt and would raise more
questions about the draft without solving the principal problem with
the defensive line, which is the lack of a high quality defensive
end.
McGlockton is basically a defensive tackle. Once in a while,
he has lined up at defensive end, but for most of his career, he has
played tackle.
Granted that he has gone to the Pro-Bowl 4 times and is a
better player than anyone else on the Dolphins defensive line.
However, he does not fill the Dolphins most pressing need on the
defensive line and it doesn't look like you can move him outside to
the end position.
But this report is pretty speculative. It was reported by
both the Herald and the Sun-Sentinel, so it seems likely that the
Dolphins are interested in McGlockton, but we don't know how
interested they are. In the Herald, Armando Salguero reported that
Bob Ackles had been on the phone with McGlockton's agent yesterday
afternoon negotiating with him, but admits later in the article that
Ackles wasn't returning phone calls and McGlockton's agent wasn't
talking either.
There also seems to be some confusion about who McGlockton's
agent actually is. The Herald is reporting that McGlockton's agent is
Sean Jones, former Packer defensive end. Jason Cole, over at the
Sun-Sentinel, reports that McGlockton's agent is Marvin Demoff - who
is also Dan Marino's agent.
Not that it matters. Whoever is McGlockton's agent will do
his best to get a deal for the player in the next 2 days, knowing that
after tomorrow, the compensation for McGlockton will go out of the
range of at least the Dolphins.
I do believe that the Dolphins are talking to McGlockton's
agent about what it would take to get a deal done, but that doesn't
mean that they will do it. The Dolphins have set the standard for
what they will pay for a defensive tackle with their offer to John
Randle of $6.5 million per year and they won't offer McGlockton that
much.
Also, if the Dolphins can't sign him to an offer sheet by
tomorrow night, they probably won't sign him because they won't want
to give up a first and third round pick next year for him.
If he was signed, that would create something of a logjam at
defensive tackle, assuming that he wasn't moved to defensive end.
Could Bowens then become trade bait to move up in the draft on
Saturday? While the Cardinals are a little too high at number 3 to
move up to, perhaps the Ravens at number 10 would be interested. They
are said to want to trade down and need a defensive tackle....
Whew. All this speculation is exhausting.
As I told my friend and boss this morning - it's already been
a long season and it's not even draft day yet! I think I'll be ready
for a nap next week - all week.
Related Info:
[Return to Dolphins News]
Curt Fennell,
curt@phins.com, DOLFAN in New Rochelle (almost)
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