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Can you win a SB with a non-rookie QB contract or is Mahomes a cheat code?


General Tso

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14 minutes ago, General Tso said:

The last non Mahomes QBs: 

Purdy

Hurts

Burrow

Stafford

Brady (The GOAT)

Garrapolo

 

LA Rams with Stafford an exception, or is that proof enough it can be done?

Rams not only had Stafford's salary on the books, but Goff's 30M dead cap hit.  Yes, the Rams had something like 60M+ committed to QB that year.  

That alone shows it's more than just the exception. 

A wider lens shows the final 8 teams each year, it's almost always top 10 QB's dominating, both with rookie and non-rookie contracts.     Focusing only on the winner doesn't really look at the process that gets contenders there - variance alone dictates if you want to understand successful practice, look at the top 4-8 teams each year to see how you get there.    That view shows there are still many paths to get there - it's just the good rookie-level contract gives the widest path.   But it's far from the only path.

Edited by Broncofan
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The Rams don't win it all without Von Miller, and I think we only had to pay him $2 million that year? I believe Donald *only* made about $19 million that year too...

So $21 million combined for AD/Von

 

Each example will have its unique context....for the Rams, I think paying the QB position an ungodly amount was offset by getting AD and playoff Von for that cheap. IMO to win a Super Bowl, its all about who maximizes the value  on their roster.

 

Mahomes is the only QB worth that much of the salary cap. Mind you....the value itself is a different conversation. QBs are so valuable that in reality, they should probably be paid MORE. But as a percent of the salary cap....that ends up being the problem because it leaves so much less room for error.

Mahomes just happens to be able to mask those errors.

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Mahomes and Staff are the only QB’s to do it in recent memory. But you also have to realize, the Rams went all-in like a baseball team and gambled everything on a one year window (which surprisingly worked). Mahomes 2022 is the only time it has truly worked out. 
 

Brady always took well-below what he was worth, because he loved winning. 

2012 - Flacco, Rookie Contract

2013 - Wilson, Rookie Contract

2014 - Brady, his usual paycut 

2015 - Manning took a 25-30% paycut before the season started to sign some FA’s

2016 - Brady, his usual paycut

2017 - Wentz, Rookie Contract, Foles, Backup Money

2018 - Brady, his usual paycut

2019 - Mahomes, Rookie Contract

2020 - Brady, his usual paycut

2021 - Stafford wins on a normal contract, but Rams sacrificed the future and went “All-In”

2022 - Mahomes on a normal contract. Mahomes breaks the cycle for the first time since 2011 Eli Manning. 

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C'mon, Tom Brady was making 50mil per year. A restructure does not equal a rookie contract.

In the last 20 years 7 teams have won with a qb on a rookie contract, including Carson Wentz (who didn't actually win the SB, but the Eagles won without a big QB contract). 4 of those 7 qbs have since won another superbowl on a big contract.

In the last 9 years 2 teams have won with rookie contract QBs.

Edited by nagahide13
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7 hours ago, Calamity_Cometh said:

We won with Manning. A lot of context needs to be added, of course. But we did.

Eli was still one of the highest paid guys when we won in 2011...although I forget what percentage cap QBs took back then compared to now.

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I feel like whenever this topic gets brought up, the answers always get tossed out. 

Can non-rookie contract QBs win a SB? Brady - eh you can’t count him because he never commanded a top dollar contract (even though he was top 6 in cap hits in his SB runs) and he’s the GOAT. Stafford - eh you can’t really count him because the Rams sold off their future and had XYZ at lower cap hits. Patrick Mahomes - eh he’s an exception to the rule because he might be the greatest ever one day. Peyton - eh he doesn’t count because he restructured (even though his cap hit was still relatively high). Brees doesn’t count because he wasn’t being paid enough even though he was off his rookie deal. Eli doesn’t count for…whatever other reason. 

So, yeah, you definitely can win a SB with a QB off their rookie contract. 

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On 2/4/2024 at 3:47 PM, Tank4Drake said:

Mahomes and Staff are the only QB’s to do it in recent memory. But you also have to realize, the Rams went all-in like a baseball team and gambled everything on a one year window (which surprisingly worked). Mahomes 2022 is the only time it has truly worked out. 
 

Brady always took well-below what he was worth, because he loved winning. 

2012 - Flacco, Rookie Contract

2013 - Wilson, Rookie Contract

2014 - Brady, his usual paycut 

2015 - Manning took a 25-30% paycut before the season started to sign some FA’s

2016 - Brady, his usual paycut

2017 - Wentz, Rookie Contract, Foles, Backup Money

2018 - Brady, his usual paycut

2019 - Mahomes, Rookie Contract

2020 - Brady, his usual paycut

2021 - Stafford wins on a normal contract, but Rams sacrificed the future and went “All-In”

2022 - Mahomes on a normal contract. Mahomes breaks the cycle for the first time since 2011 Eli Manning. 

Brady is the highest paid NFL player of all time and the gap between him and someone like Rodgers throughout their career was quite small. The paycut narrative isn’t really true. Was he under paid? Sure but so was Manning, Rodgers, Brees, so is Mahomes 

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7 minutes ago, roger murdock said:

Brady is the highest paid NFL player of all time and the gap between him and someone like Rodgers throughout their career was quite small. The paycut narrative isn’t really true. Was he under paid? Sure but so was Manning, Rodgers, Brees, so is Mahomes 

Brady always took a paycut and never took market value. Try to spin it any way you want. A QB who takes a 20% paycut is still a huge chunk of money.

Brady played 24 years at a high level, of course he’s the highest overall paid. 

Edited by Tank4Drake
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1 minute ago, Tank4Drake said:

Brady always took a paycut and never took market value. Try to spin it any way you want. A QB who takes a 20% paycut is still a huge chunk of money.

Brady played 24 years at a high level, of course he’s the highest overall paid. 

So recent history suggests that you have the best chances to win the Superbowl if you have an elite vet QB on a discounted contract. It doesn't suggest that a rookie contract is the meta however. I'd fully agree with you if the question posed in this thread were different.

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1 hour ago, nagahide13 said:

So recent history suggests that you have the best chances to win the Superbowl if you have an elite vet QB on a discounted contract. It doesn't suggest that a rookie contract is the meta however. I'd fully agree with you if the question posed in this thread were different.

So what I am seeing is 

An all time great (Brady, Mahomes)

Underpaid vet QB

Rookie contract

 

(I probably should have worded it like this) We have yet to see a QB on a max contract outside of Mahomes win a SB. There's very little margin for error in your cap allocation when that happens.

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The rookie deal just gives you more margin for error in building a great roster. If you look at all the superbowl winners cap figures/rosters, you'd find plenty of 'inefficient' uses of cap. No one is denying it gives a real advantage, as a  rookie deal QB can give 30-50million in surplus value. It just isn't the silver bullet to contending that it looks like on paper/at a superficial level.

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