According to Mike Florio of Pro Football Talk, before the Broncos signed Aqib Talib, they approached Darrelle Revis‘ camp with a similar six-year, $54MM proposal. However, Revis declined, sticking to his demand for $12MM per year. The timeline of events isn’t entirely clear, since the Broncos reached their agreement with Talib on Tuesday night, while Revis wasn’t officially released until Wednesday.
Perhaps even more interestingly, Florio hears that before pursing Talib or Revis, the Broncos also made a six-year, $54MM offer to Dominique Rodgers-Cromartie, who didn’t accept it. It’s possible that Denver’s offer to DRC didn’t include as much guaranteed money as the team’s agreement with Talib. Still, it’s a surprise that Rodgers-Cromartie would turn down such a seemingly lucrative deal unless the specific terms were very unfavorable
Florio also passes along the financial details on Talib’s contract with the Broncos, which will pay him $12MM in 2014 if he stays healthy, and has base salaries guaranteed for injury only in 2015 and 2016. The contract is more like a three-year, $27MM deal, even though it has the potential to max out at around $57MM.
If it’s true that Denver offered Revis a deal prior to signing Talib, could they be in violation of tampering rules? If so, what kind of punishment would they get?
Wouldn’t surprise me if there was some tampering involved, but I’m sure the team would deny it, and it’s not like the other 31 teams have entirely avoided tampering in the last few weeks, so I doubt anything comes of it.
— Luke