Kansas City Chiefs superstar edge rusher Justin Houston has been busy betting on himself, and he sure as heck isn’t losing, especially after he recorded a whopping 22 sacks last season to put his ten-sack streak up to three seasons. Houston still hasn’t signed his franchise tender worth $13.195 million, which makes talks between the Chiefs and the 26-year-old Georgia product all the more important.
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Pro Football Talk’s Mike Florio reports that “nothing is currently happening” between both sides as of right now, but they will “renew” talks tomorrow in what will surely be a deciding day ahead of Wednesday’s deadline. I’m sure Houston is looking to be the highest-paid defensive player in the league after posting 22 sacks last year, and he’d probably rather bet on himself to replicate that success in 2015 than take an offer that he isn’t comfortable with.
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Florio tells us to watch out for the importance of signing bonus in these negotiations, but that isn’t going to be the only hold-up in talks between Houston and the Chiefs tomorrow. Since he’s young but already one of the most proven edge rushers in the game (and he can also play some excellent run defense on a team that defended the run poorly last year due to injuries), he’s going to make sure that a long-term deal includes as much money as possible.
As of right now, Green Bay Packers elite OLB and pretty darn good ILB Clay Matthews is the highest-paid 3-4 outside linebacker in the game, and he makes $13.2 million. Look for Justin Houston to beat that amount by a pretty decent margin on his next contract no matter who it is with.
The Chiefs will do whatever they feasibly can to make sure that contract is with them, but, as per OverTheCap.com, no team has less cap space than they do. Yes, even the New Orleans Saints with $2.947 million have more cap space than the Chiefs $847,176.
Based on the fact that Houston isn’t the highest-paid OLB in the game under the franchise tag, you can understand why he is so upset about being tagged and hasn’t signed his tender yet. That means he can hold out of training camp, and it makes tomorrow’s talks all the more important (if they weren’t already) for both sides.
That said, the fact that talks will happen tomorrow is excellent news, and we’ll see if the Kansas City Chiefs can manage to keep a young, beastly, and incredibly valuable player on board through his prime as they have their designs on a return to the playoffs after coming close in 2014. I’m sure Houston would like to stay, but I’m also sure he’d like to be paid extremely handsomely after what he did last year.
Terez A. Paylor of the Kansas City Star has confirmed the PFT report.
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