Packers Center May Be Hitting Fa... Reminds Me Of Mcclure, But A Few Years Younger

[maxatlanta]

http://www.jsonline.com/sports/packers/packers-wells-likely-will-part-eyes-jq48tpp-139774733.html

Green Bay - Scott Wells has never taken no for an answer. The odds are he isn't going to now, either.

In so many words, Wells is being told by the Green Bay Packers that he has overvalued himself as an undersized, 31-year-old center no matter how well he has played for them.

Wells basically is telling the team, “Watch what happens.”

Looking for a warm and fuzzy resolution to the contractual disagreement between the Packers and their best offensive lineman?

Three weeks before the start of unrestricted free agency, the best guess is that the Packers will be playing with a new center next season.

Many times over the years the Packers have gone right to the free-agency bell before signing important veteran players to long-term deals. This time might be different.

It isn’t really an issue of cap room. General manager Ted Thompson and negotiator Russ Ball have the financial flexibility to pay Wells the contract commensurate with the five highest paid centers that he is seeking.

Rather, their offer is the result of how they perceive the market should be and will be for a veteran center.

Agent Brian Parker and Ball surely will talk face-to-face this week during the NFL Combine in Indianapolis. Each will reiterate their stances and perhaps attempt to lay groundwork for the compromise that would be necessary to keep Wells in Green Bay.

If they Packers have been low-balling Wells, they won’t much longer. They’ll move to their bottom line, and then Wells will make a decision.

Over the years, the large majority of players want to remain in Green Bay and eventually do. Just as Wells was in the minority making it big as a seventh-round draft choice, he could be in the minority again.

Having dealt with Wells for eight years, this much is true about him: he has a long memory.

Wells hasn’t forgotten that the Packers cut him at the end of his first training camp.

More critically, he hasn’t forgotten how Mike McCarthy and Thompson cast him aside after three years as their starting center and replaced him with Jason Spitz in 2009.

Sources also said the Packers at the time were looking to trade Wells, an immensely proud player they knew to be furious about his demotion.

Injuries to Spitz and other offensive linemen resulted in Wells being right back into the lineup three games into 2009. Still, Wells can wonder where his career would be if Spitz and some others had stayed healthy.

Wells responded with his finest season in ’09, topped it in ’10 and probably was even better yet in ’11. Unlike so many of his teammates, Wells wasn’t offered an early extension and played for base salaries of $2.25 million in 2010 and $2.75 million last year.

He remembers that, too.

For the first time in his football career, Wells is in charge. He’s coming off his first Pro Bowl. His health is robust. And he has the leverage associated with free agency.

A year ago, Wells saw guard Daryn Colledge move to Arizona for $5.5 million per year. Colledge is two years younger than Wells but isn’t in his league as a player.

At the same time, Wells took note of the identical five-year, $27.5 million contract that perhaps the best center in free agency, David Baas, received from the New York Giants.

Baas, 29 at the time, isn’t nearly as good as Wells, either. But at 6 feet 4 ½ inches and 330 pounds Baas is much bigger than Wells (6-2, 300), and bigger almost always is better in the eyes of NFL teams.

Baas presently ranks fifth among in centers with an average annual salary of $5.5 million. The top four are Carolina’s Ryan Kalil ($8.2M), the Jets’ Nick Mangold ($7.7M), St. Louis’ Jason Brown ($7.5M) and Tampa Bay’s Jeff Faine ($6.3M).

When their blockbuster deals were signed, Brown was 25, Kalil and Mangold were 26 and Faine was 27.

When Wells signed his five-year, $15 million extension in November 2006, he was 25.

The father of three children, Wells and his wife realize this is their last chance to achieve financial security. People that know Wells well expect him to go where the money is.

After all that Wells has gone through in Green Bay, he doesn’t figure to give the home-town discount.

Just as being stubborn and tough served Wells so well on the field, look for him to be equally competitive now.

Nine teams besides the Packers have their starting center headed for free agency. A few probably will be resigned, but either way it figures to be a game of musical chairs with 13 unrestricted centers jousting for jobs.

“If you needed a center in free agency this year, to me the first one you’d be looking at is Chris Myers,” an AFC personnel man said Monday. “Second guy would be (Dan) Koppen. Out of Wells, (Samson) Satele and (Nick) Hardwick, beauty will be in the eye of the beholder. I’d trust Scott Wells the most of those three.”

Houston’s Myers (6-4 ½, 296) and San Diego’s Hardwick (6-3 ½, 305) are 30. New England’s Koppen (6-2 ½, 296) is 32. Oakland’s Satele (6-2 ½, 300) is 27.

“Wells wouldn’t fit my height and ideal length standards,” the scout said. “But you can win with Scott Wells. I just don’t think you can with five Scott Wells.”

Atlanta and Indianapolis, two teams within a four-hour drive of Wells’ home outside Nashville, have a hole at center and could be suitors.

Three months ago, McCarthy said that “Scott’s representatives and our guys need to get to whatever that price is.”

Without Wells, McCarthy would be left with Evan Dietrich-Smith competing against maybe an aging ex-starter obtained in free agency. Wisconsin’s Peter Konz, the only top center in the draft, might not be left when the Packers pick at No. 28.

Just because Wells tests the market doesn’t mean he won’t return. James Jones came back a year ago.

But given all that is Scott Wells, he’s probably gone if the Packers haven’t signed him by March 13 at 3 p.m.

[Mattbob_Icepants]

"The father of three children, Wells and his wife realize this is their last chance to achieve financial security." Did I get something wrong or has he earned more than 15 mil already? nothing against an athletete getting paid, but making it look he has to flip burgers to support his family is kind of over the top IMO...

[vel]

"The father of three children, Wells and his wife realize this is their last chance to achieve financial security." Did I get something wrong or has he earned more than 15 mil already? nothing against an athletete getting paid, but making it look he has to flip burgers to support his family is kind of over the top IMO...

It's not that it's not a lot of money. When that will be the only source of income ($9.75MM post tax) for your family for ~50 years really, that's not really financially secure, generationally, which is what every player wants. That's why Grimes sat out. That's why Lofton isn't going to take a discount. That's why Brees still wants a big contract. Yes, some are on larger scales than others, but the main objective is to take your God-given talent, get the most money you can from it, and walk away so you don't have to work because you really aren't good at anything else. Besides Brees, who else of those names has a career in another field? None of them.

So yes, the $15MM contract that really is $9.75MM after taxes, and even less than that having lived on it for 5 years, isn't financially secure when you have roughly $8MM to live off with a wife and kids to support, for ~50 years if he retired right now.

[VaderMan]

No! Just start Hawley and let him learn. I am also against bringing back Mcclure, wwe have got to get younget, more skilled, and exsplosive. I think Hawley can do the job, then sign Ben Grubbs, sign Mcneal to a performance based contract and release Baker. I honestly think all that talk about being happy with Baker is just smoke and mirrors.

[caver50]

"The father of three children, Wells and his wife realize this is their last chance to achieve financial security." Did I get something wrong or has he earned more than 15 mil already? nothing against an athletete getting paid, but making it look he has to flip burgers to support his family is kind of over the top IMO...

Touche!! 15 M ain't nothing to sneeze at.

[JDFIII]

I am a financial planner/adviser. The thing about most of these guys is, as the stigma goes, they are good at sports, so they aren't good at managing $. If he has been smart enough to have someone invest his $ wisely, or at least put it into a savings account that is earning a decent percentage, then he could live on that $ for awhile. The problem that most people don't account for is the life expectancy for people is shooting up with the emphasis on medical research these days. A lot more people outlive their $ than used to. He could, hopefully become a coach or use his NFL background to earn after his playing days.

[vel]

I am a financial planner/adviser. The thing about most of these guys is, as the stigma goes, they are good at sports, so they aren't good at managing $. If he has been smart enough to have someone invest his $ wisely, or at least put it into a savings account that is earning a decent percentage, then he could live on that $ for awhile. The problem that most people don't account for is the life expectancy for people is shooting up with the emphasis on medical research these days. A lot more people outlive their $ than used to. He could, hopefully become a coach or use his NFL background to earn after his playing days.

That's all I am saying. $15MM is a lot to us because we are working people. But they don't take into account the taxes he has to pay on that money, bringing it down a ton. Then he probably has a million dollar home paid off. So realistically, $8MM by itself is not a lot of money to live on from 30 to ~80 years old as the only source of income. Some retirees outlive their $1MM nest egg from 65-70 to 80.

[capologist]

No! Just start Hawley and let him learn. I am also against bringing back Mcclure, wwe have got to get younget, more skilled, and exsplosive. I think Hawley can do the job, then sign Ben Grubbs, sign Mcneal to a performance based contract and release Baker. I honestly think all that talk about being happy with Baker is just smoke and mirrors.

Pretty much...

[Jaymadd]

With a new offensive scheme and new oline coach who doesn't seem like he don't take no mess I am good with hawley and signing/drafting a backup center

[capologist]

With a new offensive scheme and new oline coach who doesn't seem like he don't take no mess I am good with hawley and signing/drafting a backup center

Could easily bring Romberg back...

[Dr_truth189]

I think all that Baker talk was so we could hopefully trade him away for a Turkey sandwich lunch at Subway for the whole team.

[MattRyan2Canton]

i'm good with hawley dude was top of his draft class in bench press. if he can get the mental down he'll be golden.

[JDFIII]

What about Baker at Center? Short arms are not as big a problem there?

[Psychic Gibbon]

I'm going to stick with the novel idea of Hawley starting.

[Guest Fibonacci]

I'm going to stick with the novel idea of Hawley starting.

that and this pack rat is not much younger then McClure. it would be a waist of our money to have two good guys for two years, and pay them well; then McClure leave and we see this pack rat come in with just a couple years left. We would be finding ourselves into finding another center again and would be waisting money through the process.