Eagles extend Devonta Smith (3 / 75)

[Soko]

6 minutes ago, AZ_Eaglesfan said:

I think it is very fair to look at a contract in the lens of when the extension actually occurs. Sure the signing bonus kicks in earlier, but looking ahead at what the WR market will be in the next three seasons should absolutely be considered. That is the entire reason you get the deal done early.

Then almost all contracts and virtually any extension is a steal, because in 2-3 years, the market will go up. I’m cool with factoring in the extension (looking at it as a 5 year deal vs 3) but talking about what the deal looks like in 3 years just sounds like the usual fan justification whenever a big deal is made. Especially since the GTD money is $51M.

[Danger]

4 minutes ago, Soko said:

Then almost all contracts and virtually any extension is a steal, because in 2-3 years, the market will go up. I’m cool with factoring in the extension (looking at it as a 5 year deal vs 3) but talking about what the deal looks like in 3 years just sounds like the usual fan justification whenever a big deal is made. Especially since the GTD money is $51M.

Daniel Jones 

[AZ_Eaglesfan]

5 minutes ago, Soko said:

Then almost all contracts and virtually any extension is a steal, because in 2-3 years, the market will go up. I’m cool with factoring in the extension (looking at it as a 5 year deal vs 3) but talking about what the deal looks like in 3 years just sounds like the usual fan justification whenever a big deal is made. Especially since the GTD money is $51M.

Yeah they pretty much are lol. A lot of teams don't have the luxury of operating this way though as they aren't allowed to spend cash the way the Eagles do.

[AZ_Eaglesfan]

4 minutes ago, Danger said:

Daniel Jones 

This is different though. Extending bad players is never good. If Jones was a good player his deal would have looked fantastic.

[Jakuvious]

16 minutes ago, Danger said:

Daniel Jones 

While not a good deal, for Soko's point that all deals will look better with time, Jones is now only 12th in AAV for QB contracts. Will be roughly 16th by this time next year (Goff, Tua, Love, and Lawrence are all fairly likely to pass him.) Maybe 17th if the 49ers extend Purdy early.

IMO, the two worst common defenses for contracts are, we can get out of it after X years, or X years from now it'll look so much better. Because both are effectively admitting that right now, it doesn't look great.

[Soko]

18 minutes ago, AZ_Eaglesfan said:

Yeah they pretty much are lol. A lot of teams don't have the luxury of operating this way though as they aren't allowed to spend cash the way the Eagles do.

That’s the disconnect, then. If Devonta is like the 25th paid WR in 2026 and is still playing at a high level, I’m cool with calling his contract great value then. 

If the deal was actually a steal, you wouldn’t have to add the caveat that it will in X years when the market is up. That logic is exactly how Kyler Murray got the horrendous contract he’s under.

Edited April 15 by Soko

[Kiltman]

1 hour ago, Soko said:

Eh, I’m not a fan of “this contract will look fine in X years”. Almost any contract is justifiable under those circumstances, yet teams still find themselves with bad contracts/cap problems. 

Devonta got a good deal for him, but he’s a good player in his prime, so it is what it is. It’d hurt losing him a lot more than it’s going to hurt paying him, IMO. But I’m not going to sit here and pretend it’s a steal or modest value lol.

EDIT: I will say, it’d have been interesting if they took the Tee Higgins approach with him. I’d rather have Smith as WR1 than Higgins.

If you remove context you can shape any narrative you need. Removing future context / foresight doesn’t make a ton of sense. 

Especially when there are more than a handful of guys his age that need deals too this or next year. It’s not a low chance future prediction. Also by the nature of it happening it sets a benchmark for those deals that usually means Smith’s deal will be the starting spot for players agents, that are in similar situations.

 

[Danger]

The contract looks good now, when you consider there are at least 7 WRs lined up right behind Devonta

[Soko]

20 minutes ago, Kiltman said:

If you remove context you can shape any narrative you need. Removing future context / foresight doesn’t make a ton of sense. 

Especially when there are more than a handful of guys his age that need deals too this or next year. It’s not a low chance future prediction. Also by the nature of it happening it sets a benchmark for those deals that usually means Smith’s deal will be the starting spot for players agents, that are in similar situations.

You can also over contextualize to try and justify a deal. Basically responded to this in the post above. It’s not really an under market deal if the caveat is that it’s not under market today, but will be in a few years when the market goes up lol.

It’s like buying a stock at today’s market value, but then calling it a steal because of market inflation. Contracts looking better as time goes on is par for the course, that doesn’t mean they’re all steals.

Edited April 15 by Soko

[renndawg37]

3 hours ago, seminoles1 said:

Smith had better production on 24 less targets with a much higher success rate, catch rate, yards per target, yards per route run, and every other metric known to man. Smith is also 4 years younger and just hitting his prime while Ridley is going to turn 30 this season.

These things are not the same.

He also faced teams' second best cover guy...while Ridley didn't lol 🤷

Edited April 15 by renndawg37

[AZ_Eaglesfan]

6 minutes ago, Soko said:

You can also over contextualize to try and justify a deal. Basically responded to this in the post above. It’s not really an under market deal if the caveat is that it’s not under market today, but will be in a few years when the market goes up lol.

It’s like buying a stock at today’s market value, but then calling it a steal because of market inflation. Contracts looking better as time goes on is par for the course, that doesn’t mean they’re all steals.

Paying good players early is just better than paying them later. Sure you can argue that today two years before the extension actually ever kicks in that the value is at market and I would agree. That is pretty much entirely missing the point of the argument though. The Eagles also could have just sat on Devonta for two years, tagged him, and negotiated a three year deal down the line. What do you think the AAV on his contract would be if they did that?

The Eagles are spending cash now to save money long term. Sure there are inherent risks in this(injury, player performance falling off etc.), but that is the entire point of doing the deal now is that in three years it looks much better lol.

[Jakuvious]

30 minutes ago, Kiltman said:

If you remove context you can shape any narrative you need. Removing future context / foresight doesn’t make a ton of sense. 

Especially when there are more than a handful of guys his age that need deals too this or next year. It’s not a low chance future prediction. Also by the nature of it happening it sets a benchmark for those deals that usually means Smith’s deal will be the starting spot for players agents, that are in similar situations.

This is a kind of endless process, though. Is Smith's deal the starting point for the deals that are signed next year? Or is Smith's deal the endpoint for deals that have already been signed? Is it a steal because Aiyuk is about to sign for more, or is it a ripoff because Pittman just signed for less? Or was Pittman a steal since the Colts signed him before this, and Smith is a steal because the Eagles signed him before Aiyuk, and Aiyuk will be a steal because.....and on and on it goes.

This argument in favor of contracts, that the contracts next month or year or decade will be higher, is so generic, in applying to literally every contract that is signed, to be meaningless as a point of evaluation of the contract. The extensions always don't kick in right away. The contracts are always backloaded. The deals will always look better when the next round of players at that position are signed.

Like, credit to the Eagles for working ahead, this is one year earlier than they really needed to do this, and that does save them some money. Always a smart move as long as you're sure that player will maintain their value. Kudos to them for that. But, a deal is either good or it isn't. And we can evaluate based on the deals that have already been signed. You shouldn't have to justify it by saying it will look cheaper 3 years from now because 8 other guys will have signed extensions. If it's a good deal at value, it should just be a good deal without jumping through the same hoops that every other fanbase does in this forum whenever there are doubts about a deal that is signed.

And I don't even think this is a bad value, I just hate this desperate justification every time a deal gets signed. The guy is worth it or he isn't. If you're rationalizing, maybe he isn't.

[Soko]

11 minutes ago, AZ_Eaglesfan said:

Paying good players early is just better than paying them later. Sure you can argue that today two years before the extension actually ever kicks in that the value is at market and I would agree. That is pretty much entirely missing the point of the argument though. The Eagles also could have just sat on Devonta for two years, tagged him, and negotiated a three year deal down the line. What do you think the AAV on his contract would be if they did that?

The Eagles are spending cash now to save money long term. Sure there are inherent risks in this(injury, player performance falling off etc.), but that is the entire point of doing the deal now is that in three years it looks much better lol.

Yeah, I didn’t push back on any of that. I think the Eagles made the right move and they made a good decision getting it done sooner. 

[Folesadelphia]

14 minutes ago, Soko said:

Yeah, I didn’t push back on any of that. I think the Eagles made the right move and they made a good decision getting it done sooner. 

I think if your point is that this is not a "steal", I would  agree. I will say getting the contract done before these other WR deals get done here in the next couple months is good business. I don't think it's necessary to sugarcoat it and say the deal will look better in the future because it looks fine to me now. However, I think it's fair to compare this deal with the deals other WRs get this off-season and by getting Smith done first, it's likely Smith will have one of the lower money contracts for WRs of his same ilk that are signed this off-season.  The deal is right in line with how much I thought he would get and the Eagles are able to retain their homegrown WR on a second contract. I'm happy to have him locked up for the foreseeable future.

[Danger]

1 hour ago, Soko said:

You can also over contextualize to try and justify a deal. Basically responded to this in the post above. It’s not really an under market deal if the caveat is that it’s not under market today, but will be in a few years when the market goes up lol.

It’s like buying a stock at today’s market value, but then calling it a steal because of market inflation. Contracts looking better as time goes on is par for the course, that doesn’t mean they’re all steals.

It'll be under market by the 2025 nfl draft.