The 49ers weren’t the only team to miss out on Le’Veon Bell. Vic Tafur of The Athletic writes that the Raiders made an offer to the star running back, and “there was some real buzz in the building” yesterday.
The reporter also notes that the Raiders thought they could land Bell if “money wasn’t the most important thing,” as the running back reportedly preferred to play for the Raiders. After missing out on Bell, the team also took a run at Mark Ingram, who ended up landing in Baltimore.
Bell ultimately agreed to a four-year, $52.5MM deal with the Jets, forcing the Raiders to look elsewhere for a running back. At the moment, the team is rostering three backs in DeAndre Washington, Chris Warren, and James Butler.
Let’s check out some more notes out of Oakland…
- The Raiders weren’t even considering an Antonio Brown trade until the deal between the Steelers and Bills fell apart, general manager Mike Mayock told Mike Florio of ProFootballTalk.com (Twitter link). The organization ultimately acquired the Pro Bowl wide receiver in exchange for a third- and fifth-round pick in this year’s draft.
- The Raiders continued to show interest in wideout Tyrell Williams even after pulling off the Brown trade, according to Jason La Canfora (on Twitter). The team ended up agreeing to a four-year, $44MM deal ($22MM guaranteed) earlier today. La Canfora notes that several other teams pursued Williams, including the Ravens, Saints, Steelers, Jets. Many of those teams were offering contracts between $8MM and $9MM annually, with the 27-year-old ultimately receiving $11MM a season from the Raiders.
- The Raiders are planning to rely on Lamarcus Joyner as their primary nickel cornerback, writes Michael Gehlken of the Las Vegas Review-Journal. The 28-year-old has primarily played safety throughout his career, although he did play some cornerback early on his career. The team will occasionally deploy Joyner at safety, although Gehlken notes that the team could still add another player at the position. Joyner is set to sign a four years, $42MM deal with the Raiders.
Is anyone really surprised with the bell that it was not the team he preferred but the team that paid the most? From what I hear the difference in money was not all that much but yet he was going to go to the highest better no matter what.
According to multiple people on Twitter and TV, Curtis Martin is the reason he chose the Jets. He was a big fan, plus Martin was apart of the recruiting process.
Yeah I thought the same thing. He literally didn’t play last year because he wanted the most money possible so that should surprise no one.
He locked himself into that situation by saying no to the Steelers higher deal. He let 17 million go last year (very stupid) and turned down a higher deal (very stupid). The guaranteed money needed to be 45 to 50 million to make his decision a wise one. He made his bed and now he gets to play for the lowly Jets. At the end of the day, most of these players only play for money not for the love of the game or winning a SB. Only QB’s get to say stupid stuff like “I want to win a SB” because they get paid big time for being mediocre. Look at Foles. Decent guy, average QB, just landed an 88 million contract with 50 million in guaranteed money. Foles is NOT a better football player than Bell. However, the league has devalued the RB and their a bunch of 4th round or later guys who can come in a run for a lot cheaper.
He sat out a year because he didn’t like the lack of guaranteed money attached to the tag. What the hell made the Raiders think that this was ever about anything other than money?
These same dudes keep posting incorrectly about how he turned down higher deal from the Steelers. The $70 mil contract only had $10 mil fully guaranteed for the first year, then “rolling guarantees that would’ve moved the total up to 33 over first two years. What they don’t mention is that the Steelers could’ve cut him after the first year. So much for that guaranteed money.
What’s the likelihood that the Steelers would have cut a productive Bell after one year? Based on how many times have they done that to star players? People keep wanting to play up the Jets deal as so much greater than what the Steelers offered him 2 years ago and just want to forget he was demanding 17-18mil per year. Did he get that from the Jets, no? Plus, people just want to forget the income tax impact on Bell’s new deal. Facts matter,
Clearly Bell doesn’t trust himself to stay on the field, and honestly I don’t blame him because he hasn’t been able to. So why would the Steelers want to put themselves in that situation with all the guaranteed money he was asking for?
So, Why do Steelers fans continue to lie about how sweet the offer was? You know exactly what the “fully guaranteed” part of the deal was. Hey man, who cares what the likelihood of them cutting him was? Could he have gotten 350-400 more touches and gotten injured, yes? Did he get as much as he possibly wanted? No. But don’t make it seem like he turned some awesome deal to stay in Pittsburgh. They made a business decision that they didn’t want to guarantee past one year, so why are fans so mad that he made a business decision that he wanted more security? Why should he make a career decision on a hypothetical scenario that they won’t cut him if injured?
I’m not mad at Bell, I’m mad that people act like the Steelers are this terrible franchise that mistreats its players.
Well… plenty of fans act like they compensate players more than they actually do. It’s well known in the industry that they don’t guarantee contracts after the first year, even though they throw out those big, shiny numbers. Fyi…. if you’ve been apart rumors over the last year, then you know there are plenty of fans that are mad at Bell for choosing to make a business decision, just like the Steelers made their decision.