The Jordan Love deal won't cost the Packers nearly as much as you think
The top-line numbers from Jordan Love's new extension don't accurately reflect how the deal fits into the Packers' books over the next few seasons.
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Good morning!
It was more than Christmas in July for Jordan Love, but he still got the bag. The Green Bay Packers’ franchise quarterback signed a four-year, $220 million extension just in time for the team’s first padded practice of training camp.
Today's edition of The Leap attempts to quell any fears about this contract handcuffing the Packers’ future.
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Setting aside whether or not one year was enough to pay Jordan Love, won’t this new contract hurt the team’s ability to build for the future?
Peter Bukowski: In a word: no. Or perhaps more precisely, not yet. Despite the $55 million average annual value Jordan Love’s extension officially carries, the quarterback only counts $20.8 million against their books in 2024. For context, the team had to carry more than twice that amount last year for Love and the dead money remaining from Aaron Rodgers’ contract. And despite those financial limitations, Green Bay became the youngest team ever to win a playoff game.
The numbers for him don’t balloon until 2027, and even then, they’ll be manageable with the cap perpetually climbing. In Year 3, for example, Love will carry the 16th highest cap hit in the NFL, placing him behind guys like Baker Mayfield. This was what Love gave up by pushing for the four-year deal.
In exchange for the shorter deal, the concessions likely came in the AAV where Love could have pushed for $56 million or more with a fifth year. As it is, Love broke the signing-bonus record with $75 million just for writing his name a couple of times on the paper, but there aren’t significant guarantees in the future of the deal. Not to mention, there’s a final year Love will never see.
But get this: Joe Burrow signed a five-year extension at the same average annual value. Starting after the 2024 season, Burrow will count more on the cap in each of the next five seasons than any year of the Love extension except that last one when his cap hit balloons to over $70 million.
What’s more, that fourth year -- again, this is a fake year Love will never play under -- is the only season in which Love would count at least that $55 million annual number.
And while Love’s agent gets to say, “Hey, they broke the signing bonus record,” that’s just fine with the Packers because they get to spread that money out via mafia accounting. The rolling guarantees coming in later years as bonuses will likely be converted so they can be spread out as well.
Green Bay has a window of at least the next three years before they have to think about renegotiating, and new quarterback megadeals will make Love look underpaid by comparison if he maintains anything close to last year’s level of play.
Rookie Evan Williams revealed to the media that Xavier McKinney will make pre-snap calls on which safety plays deep and which one rolls forward in single-high looks. Rookie mistake?
PB: Packers head coach Matt LaFleur didn’t sound happy when he was asked about this. “I’m glad Evan is giving away our secrets,” he said Sunday. But if it was a big mistake, it’s one of the few Williams has made so far in camp. He added another interception to his tally in the last week by undercutting a Sean Clifford throw. His explanation will have you believe it’s no fluke either.
“Honestly, I was just reading the quarterback," Williams told Packers.com. “I kind of felt the route combos to the front side push away from me and knew there was probably something coming from the back side, got a dig from the backside and was just able to jump it.”
A rookie using his spatial awareness, route recognition, and football IQ to go make a play on the football … and he actually caught the ball.
Green Bay’s top safeties -- Williams, fellow rookie Javon Bullard, second-year pro Anthony Johnson Jr., and Xavier McKinney -- have enjoyed such promising early returns under new DC Jeff Hafley that LaFleur fielded multiple questions over the weekend about what might be driving this drastic change.
The Packers intercepted seven passes last season, the second fewest in the league. Two potential picks went right through their hands in the playoff loss to the San Francisco 49ers, plays that could have sent them to the NFC Championship Game. So far in camp though, it’s been like the end of an Oprah episode: Everyone gets an interception.
Between Williams and “Bull” -- a nickname for Bullard that LaFleur dropped to media on Sunday -- the Packers added highly instinctive players capable of creating turnovers and splash plays. And with McKinney as the secondary’s de facto quarterback, they should be in the right place more often. LaFleur finally has a defense that plays the same style he preaches on offense: the illusion of complexity.
Everything is meant to be simple in this defense, fast, free-flowing, and decisive. In order to make that work, it’s not complicated, but it is confusing. Pre and post-snap safety rotations, designer blitzes and more are meant to look the same, but end up very different, precisely the way LaFleur designs offense.
Maybe the secret is out about McKinney making calls before the snap. But the secret of this new-look defense is out too, and the players are loving it. I have a feeling opponents won’t share in the enthusiasm.