‘What market?’ How pandemic, draft depressed WRs’ wages — perhaps to Dolphins’ benefit
Free agency Day 1 came and went, and the Miami Dolphins remained in serious need of weapons.
As of 9 p.m. Monday, they hadn’t signed a single wide receiver or a running back.
But in a weird way, that actually could be a positive.
It meant that Chris Grier and Brian Flores did not overpay in a market that was solid, but not spectacular. They also didn’t panic.
And their patience could be rewarded Tuesday.
Because for receivers expecting to cash in, much of the day was a disaster.
“Crashing,” was how one agent put the market for wideouts mid-afternoon.
“What market?” quipped another, during the height of his despondency, adding that his clients are getting offered deals at 50 cents on the dollar.
And while agents can be prone to hyperbole on a good day — let alone on disappointing ones for both themselves and their clients — this was no overreaction.
It’s hard to see how Monday could have gone worse for many of the biggest names.
Kenny Golladay, projected by Spotrac prior to free agency to fetch a four-year, $73 million offer, didn’t get the contract offer he wanted. Neither did Curtis Samuel, John Brown, Will Fuller or JuJu Smith-Schuster.
Why?
A host of reasons.
But mostly it came down to money. The pandemic caused the salary cap to drop by 8 percent. And since the draft looks to be loaded with receivers — as many as 35 could go in the first five rounds, Mel Kiper Jr. recently noted — there simply is not the demand there would be in a normal year.
All of this could be good news for the play-it-slow Dolphins, whose free agency approach did a 180 from last year, when they were Day 1’s biggest spenders. With somewhere in the neighborhood of $30 million in cap space this time around, they have some room to maneuver, but not their resources are not unlimited.
So they waited. And let the market come to them.
Slowly, it did — thanks in large part to a couple of rivals.
The New England Patriots — who went on a spending bender after a 7-9 season — added two receivers: Nelson Agholor (at two years for $26 million, according to reports) and Kendrick Bourne (three for $22.5 million).
And as the sun set in Manhattan, the New York Jets locked up Corey Davis with a contract that will pay him as much as $37.5 million over the next three years.
Still, the biggest prize — Golladay — remained, and the Dolphins suddenly seemed like real players to land him.
The agent for another prominent wide receiver who signed Monday told the Herald he considered Miami the front-runner for Golladay, but that was just his opinion from talking to teams.
It should be noted that the Dolphins would still have lots of work to do, even if they land Golladay.
One of those needs is pass rusher. Free agent edge defenders had a better go of it than wide receivers — Shaq Barrett, Leonard Floyd, Matt Judon, Romeo Okwara, Bud Dupree, Carl Lawson and Yannick Ngakoue all agreed to multiyear contracts paying them at least $13 million annually — but even some big names were left wanting more late in the day.
Jadeveon Clowney, Trey Hendrickson, Melvin Ingram and Haason Reddick were all without new deals as of 9 p.m., and the longer they go without one, the less likely it is they’ll get what they want.
That, of course, is bad news for them. But it’s good news for the Dolphins, who in the past week cut Kyle Van Noy and traded Shaq Lawson. They need at least two edge defenders from free agency and the draft, even after bringing back Vince Biegel Monday on a one-year deal. Biegel missed all of 2020 with a torn Achilles but was a solid contributor on defense and special teams in 2019.
Two front seven Dolphins players who won’t be back? Defensive tackle Davon Godchaux and linebacker Kamu Grugier-Hill, who signed free agent contracts with the Patriots and Texans, respectively.
▪ The Dolphins signed Bengals tight end/fullback Cethan Carter to a three-year deal, NFL Network first reported. Carter never logged fewer than 63 percent of the Bengals’ special teams snaps in his three healthy seasons.
▪ The Dolphins formally signed punter Michael Palardy to a one-year contract after the two sides agreed to the deal late last week. Palardy, who missed all of last year with a non-football injury, has a 40.3 net punting average in his career, spent mostly with the Carolina Panthers.
This story was originally published March 15, 2021 at 9:26 PM.
