Jalen Ramsey Show – 008: Goodwill Negotiations

Welcome to another hour of The Jalen Ramsey Show. We’ve had some really great calls and great callers so far today and I’m looking forward to seeing what hour three has ahead for us. If you’d like to join me on the air to discuss your life and your money, we have open lines at 818-338-0011. Let’s kick things off today with Melvin from Inglewood, Cal-ee-forn-eye-aye. Melvin, welcome to the Jalen Ramsey Show.

Hey Jalen. Thanks for taking my call man. How’s it going?

Better than the Jaguars under Tom Coughlin. How can I help?

Hey man, I wanted to get your opinion on some changes to my contract I just made.

Alright, whatcha got?

To make a long story short, I’m in the final season of a four-year contract. My agent has been working on an extension but, with everything starting back up and no deal in place, team ownership signed on to guarantee my full contract for this season. It seemed like a win-win at the time, I mean, i was holding out from camp activities and that got us back to, you know, the status quo.

Well, we don’t like to do deals unless they’re win-win. And, in the interim anyways, I’m sure it pleases the team to pad your pockets today in the hopes that you’ll be fat and happy for these extension negotiations.

But, man, I am thinking that there may not be a place here for me next year. I mean, my agent says so too. That the way they’re signing deals with other guys, I’m not going to have a place on the roster without a steep discount on my next contract. And I appreciate them guaranteeing my salary this year but how much am I expected to give back on the next deal?

Nothing.

They make it sound —

Which is why you have a contract. No one cares what anything sounds like. It’s what is in the contract that makes noise. They guaranteed your 2020 contract money and that got you on the field for 2020. Now, ’21 and beyond is a whole other negotiation. Understandably, your agent thinks you should consider playing elsewhere in the future. I mean, when everyone else around you is eating up the salary cap while Justin Herbert may not even be ready to take over the offense then, yeah, letting you walk makes sense. But if Tyrod Taylor has a resurgence — and I actually think Taylor’s better than he gets credit for; the guy doesn’t make mistakes — then his style of game management leans on a strong defense and, who knows, maybe your front office sees the window as open now, rather than waiting on Herbert.

Maybe. But how do we handle negotiations not knowing about the QB situation?

That’s what you pay an agent for. Look, we get a lot of negotiation questions here and for good reason. You’re dealing with men hired by the organization to represent their interests in negotiations. You need to hire someone to represent your interests. It’s like I tell everyone, you handle your game and let the agent get you your money. Trust me, no matter how small your contract, when you have a bad game, they’re gonna rip on you. Similarly, you get Joey Bosa money and perform, ain’t no way Coach Lynn is gonna pull you aside after a playoff win and bitch that you got paid too much. I appreciate you’re taking the team into account here and — well, let me ask, have they been fair with you?

Yeah, they actually have. I was franchise tagged in ’17 but they worked with us to ink a new deal that June so it was never really an issue. Then add this to it and, yeah, I think Chargers ownership has been fair with me.

And it sounds like you’ve been fair to them. So, it’s just business now. If you like it in Inglewood and want to take a haircut to stay, that’s fine. It’s your life and your money, as we say here on the Jalen Ramsey Show, so do with it what you want. But do what you want; you don’t owe the Chargers anything in the next contract talks. Great call. That’s a good discussion because, you know, as difficult as heated negotiations are, sometimes splitting hairs with people you somewhat value a personal relationship with can be more of a challenge. But just as you leave your play on the field, when you take off the pads and the helmets, that means it is time to handle business. You’re on the right track, Melvin, so you make 2020 count and you’ll find a well-funded landing spot somewhere next season.

Alright, let’s move over to Bob Allenpark in Michigan. BobAllen, what’s happening man?

I uh, it’s actually Bob and I am calling from Allen Park.

I don’t care. What’s your question?

Yeah, I uhhh, we’re having a problem here with union labor and they’re pushing for days off when, you know, it’s not in their union agreement with management here. I’m a little concerned, you know, with Portland and all the vandals protesting the suburbs and everything and, you know you talk about contracts a lot and, I don’t know, I thought you could help me with getting these jokers back to work.

I mean, if they’re illegally striking then they’re illegally striking. If they’re playing games and everyone is calling in sick kind of thing, there ain’t much you can do, you know. How long has this been going on?

Well, it was just yesterday, actually. You know, there was a…a…a GUY…who crossed that thin blue line and, you know, he got what he got. And now I got players like, taking the day off.

And you’re concerned that guys are missing running routes and sitting in meetings.

Well, it’s the whole thing. I think it sets a bad precedence, for one. I mean, I want guys who want to play football and my quarterback — who’s white so I don’t know why he sounds like freaking Kanye West instead of Drew Brees — announcing to the local media that, “football is the last thing on [his] mind right now.” I mean, what happened to getting football guys with a passion for the game, Jalen?

What kind of things do you do to build comradery within the locker room? I mean, do you host dinners? Sex cruises? Game nights?

Yeah we do. We recognize that the culture we’re building here in Detroit needs to look a lot more like New England. But it’s tough because I guarantee you no one in Massachusetts took the day off because some thug broke the law. And, speaking of thugs, they have Cam Newton, you know!

Well, I could scold you in many ways but, if the last four years have taught us anything. it’s that you’re too stupid and emotional to analyse your own self. So, if I were as much of a ridiculous caricature of the younger brother Jason Garrett would have bullied like yourself, I’d say just go back to the calendar and mark off yesterday as a comradery day. That’s it. Or, if you don’t want to listen to me, just follow your gut. I’m sure nothing could go wrong by taking action against professionals behaving in compliance with their contracts during training camp of a wasted season to make a basically nonexistent social justice statement. So, whatever you do decide, I guess I can just ask that you follow through with your decision 100%.

So that will do it for today. Thanks for the great calls and I just want to remind everyone out there that, if you get some time, check out Big Ben’s production since losing Antonio Brown. Dude should have followed Andrew Luck out of the league. Anyways, you all mask up and we’ll see you next time, right here, on The Jalen Ramsey Show.