The Vikings have re-signed center Brett Jones, per a club announcement. It’s a one-year deal with a base salary of $850K that could be worth up to $1.5MM through incentives, according to Chris Tomasson of the Pioneer Press (on Twitter).
The Vikings acquired Jones late last summer via trade with the Giants. In his first season with the Vikes, Jones appeared in 14 games, including three starts at center. Prior to that, Jones appeared in 30 games (14 starts) across three seasons with the G-Men and won a Grey Cup title in 2014 with the CFL’s Calgary Stampeders.
The Vikings offered Jones a contract earlier this month, but he did not immediately accept. Meanwhile, center Tyler Shatley circled back to the Jaguars after visiting with the Vikings and Jones, as far as we know, did not go on any other visits. It only made sense for the two sides to reunite as the Vikings needed a backup for Pat Elflein.
Jones started the first three games of the 2018 season while Elflein was injured. He’s likely eager to start somewhere, as he did with the Giants in 2017, but he’ll serve as Elflein’s understudy for at least one more year. Jones can also play guard, which may give him another path to getting on the field.
I thought “we” didn’t even have enough cap space left to sign our draft picks..?
Griffen has his contract re-worked and you know someone with a bigger salary is going to get cut to make room. I believe Rudolph Aldo has his contract re-worked. Jones didn’t sign for much either. A drop in the bucket…
Jones’ deal has a base under $1 mil but can top out at $1.5 mil. Rudolph’s deal has not been re-done, and I don’t think anyone with a big salary will be cut. There might still be a trade that will free up cap space – Waynes for a draft pick, for instance – but I advocate extending Waynes, Rudolph and Harris and freeing up maybe a total of $8 million in cap space by converting 2019 salary dollars to bonuses.