Patriots: Top free agent clears the air surrounding controversy
Apparently the reports were false.
Free-agent wide receiver Odell Beckham Jr. has spoken.
A week after ProFootballTalk reported that Beckham was looking for a contract $20 million per year, the wide receiver, who missed all of 2022 with a torn ACL, tweeted insinuating that the report was false.
"I’m just so confused where the quote is from me tht said I want 20…..😭🙄all I’m sayin is 4 AINT enough," Beckham tweeted Saturday.
There’s a pretty significant difference between $4 million and $20 million a year, and with the way wide receivers are getting paid this offseason, it might be difficult for Beckham to convince a team to bridge that gap into the $12 million-per-year range.
The top free-agent wide receivers, Jakobi Meyers and Allen Lazard, signed contracts worth $11 million per year. JuJu Smith-Schuster received just $8.5 million per year, Robert Woods got $7.625M per year and Darius Slayton received $6 million per year.
It might sound unfair to compare Beckham to those receivers, but no one has seen him play football, outside of a workout held for NFL teams last week in Arizona, since Super Bowl LVI. The New England Patriots were one of the teams present for that workout, and it sounds like they might be willing to sign Beckham if they deem him a value, but they’re certainly not going to get into a bidding war or pay top dollar for him. Their attendance was more about checking in on the situation and doing their due diligence.
The Patriots have already signed Smith-Schuster and tight end/wide receiver Mike Gesicki this offseason. Gesicki’s deal is worth just $4.5 million with another $4.5 million in incentives.
Kenny Golladay, Adam Thielen, Chosen Anderson, Nelson Agholor, D.J. Chark and Marvin Jones are among the wide receivers still available in free agency. DeAndre Hopkins and some of the Denver Broncos’ wide receivers reportedly could be available via trade.
There was never any chance Beckham was going to receive $20 million per year without absurd incentives tied into the contract. It’s more possible that he could hit $12 million in incentives. What he might need to do is sign a low-risk, one-year contract heavy on incentives similar to what Smith-Schuster did with the Kansas City Chiefs last year to reset his market. It didn’t work great for Smith-Schuster. He made $10.2 million last season and has the upside to make $11 million per year in New England, but his base contract is for just $8.5 million per year.
Featured image via Gary A. Vasquez-USA TODAY Sports
