The NFL quarterback market has seen players getting shorter deals, and that's the new trend. Joe Burrow, Trevor Lawrence, Justin Herbert, and Lamar Jackson signed five-year contracts. But Tua Tagovailoa, Jordan Love, and Dak Prescott reached four-year extensions. Good for the Buffalo Bills, they signed him to a six-year extension back in 2021, which created a hugely team-friendly environment for years to come.

Eventually, what seemed a strong yearly average of $43 million became obsolete, and now it's $17 million behind the top of the market. In the offseason, the Bills made a short-term move to fix that, pushing money from the future to compensate Allen better this season.

He is making $60 million in 2024, but is slated to make only $14.5 million in 2025. It's an inflection point, and Allen obviously won't play under that figure next season. Soon, parties will have to sit again and negotiate a new contract.

How much

The question is not if, but when and for how much Josh Allen will sign a new extension with the Bills. It has to be before Week 1 in 2025, and probably before training camp too.

Josh Allen still has $129.554 million and four years to play under his old deal, an average of $32.388 million. That gives the Bills some leverage to find a new deal, but also some flexibility to structure the extension in a team-friendlier way.

On Saturday, The Athletic Football Show released a special episode talking about the quarterback market, and host Robert Mays talked about interesting topics with Brad Spielberger, a former PFF cap analyst and current Director of Football Administration at Grand Central Sports Management.

They agreed that the floor for Josh Allen is something around $65 million per season, maybe getting closer to $70 million a year, after Prescott signed a contract with a $60 million per season.

How it would work

A potential scenario is to give Josh Allen a three-year, $210 million extension. By doing that, the Bills would make Allen the highest-paid player in NFL history and secure him under contract through 2031.

At the same time, in total, it would be a seven-year, $339.554 million deal. The real average, $48.5 million per season, is much more conducive for team success. Obviously, Allen would demand strong guarantees to agree to such a deal, but based on Allen's production, there's little reason for the Bills to deny him that.

Josh Allen is 28 years old, and he still has several years of prime production left. The Buffalo Bills have a huge opportunity to take advantage of that, putting themselves in position to build a strong environment around an elite quarterback.

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