Posts tagged BrianUrlacher at FanHouse - AOL Sports Blog

Obviously, Tommie Harris is the big winner after signing a four-year, $40 million deal, but the Bears have to be pretty happy to lock up one of the most important cogs in their defense. One of the players Harris protects, middle linebacker Brian Urlacher, should be ecstatic over the news.

Not only does he have one of the league's best defensive tackles in front of him, Harris' new contract should free up some money for Urlacher to get that extension he's been bellyaching about all offseason. Cue ESPN's John Clayton:

Urlacher may end up being all right with the Tommie Harris deal because it does give the Bears room to enhance the linebacker's contract. Urlacher makes in the $7 million-a-year range and clearly needs to be the highest paid defender on the team. There could have been a camp holdout if he was going to make $3 million-a-year less cash than Harris. The fact Harris put close to $10 million of his $40 million in things he has to earn, the Bears can give Urlacher a couple million dollars-a-year more and make him the highest paid Bears defender. That deal could be worked out before camp.

So one less thing the Bears have to worry about. Hooray for progress.

Just when you think you've got all the answers to Brian Urlacher's current relationship with the Bears, he changes all the questions. Last week he continued his tradition of missing the team's OTAs and earned a response from the Bears that they weren't willing to negotiate with players who weren't taking part in practices. Voluntary or not, teams aren't thrilled by players under contract who choose to skip the workouts.

Urlacher wasn't swayed by that argument. Well, he wasn't swayed by it last week, anyway. What a difference a few days makes because #54 was on the practice field for today's OTA. The Chicago Tribune reports that Urlacher said on Tuesday that no deal was imminent. Discussions have been going on between the team and Urlacher's camp, though.

The Bears made it clear that talks would continue to remain positive if Urlacher returned to the practice field. That's part of the reason he showed Wednesday. But no new figures have been traded between the sides, although Urlacher presence at OTAs could change that.

If his appearance today was merely a good faith gesture, it was a smart one. Urlacher wasn't happy with the team's first offer and reacted by taking his ball and going home. That's posturing and it wouldn't be good business to just throw money at every player who pouted. Urlacher's not every player, though, and his reappearance should go a long way to a second offer coming across the table.

Any idea that Brian Urlacher and the Bears had settled all their squabbles when the linebacker showed up for last week's mandatory minicamp seems to be premature. Urlacher was a no-show for yesterday's voluntary workouts which indicates that his desire for a new contract will continue to cause friction between him and the team.

In retrospect, we probably should have seen it coming. Urlacher wasn't guaranteeing anything last Friday.

''Not sure,'' he said when asked if he would be at OTAs. ''Possibly. Maybe. Yes. No. Pick any one of those answers you want.''

Because this workout was voluntary, Urlacher cannot be fined nor can the Bears go after the remainder of his signing bonus. Both were possibilities if he'd missed last weekend's minicamp. With no financial motivation urging him to participate, Urlacher didn't.

The Bears have said they aren't willing to negotiate with players who are AWOL. He's turned down the one deal the Bears have offered but doesn't seem to have much interest in finding a middle ground with the team to create a compromise. Continuing to show up for practice would likely have helped get things moving. If Urlacher misses the rest of this week and next week's OTAs, though, there's little chance any deal will get done before training camp opens.

Guess who's back in the mother-fudgin' house? Brian Urlacher, that's who. After weeks of all but guaranteeing that he'd skip this weekend's mandatory minicamp, the Chicago Tribune reports that Urlacher's in the Windy City and planning on going to practice.

That doesn't mean he isn't still looking for a new contract. More likely, he had his mind swayed by the potential loss of nearly $4 million if the Bears tried to seize his signing bonus as punishment for skipping camp. The team hasn't, to our knowledge, proffered an offer after Urlacher balked at their one-year extension. It would have paid him $5 million up front, an additional $1 million for the life of the existing deal if he played 85% of the defensive snaps and a base salary of $7.5 million in 2012, the final season.

Urlacher's complained about how the market has changed since he signed his current deal but there isn't much to back up that assertion. Yes, many players are now paid more than Urlacher but not many linebackers. Lofa Tatupu, for instance, signed a six-year, $42 million extension. That's more than Urlacher but not egregiously more. The extension the Bears offered would bring him right in line with whatever inflation has occurred and, given his age and injury history, that's reasonable.

That's an argument for another day, though. For now the Bears can put the soap opera on the back burner and concentrate on getting ready for 2008 with their whole roster.

I'm sorta surprised Lance Briggs didn't convene a press conference to relate the latest on Brian Urlacher, but either way, the Chicago Sun-Times' Brad Briggs writes that the Bears middle linebacker could face stiff penalties if he skips out on the team's mandatory minicamp:

While the fine can total only $8,165, more than $5.7 million is potentially at stake if Urlacher boycotts minicamp. That represents the pro-rated portion remaining on the $13 million signing bonus he received with his nine-year, $56.65 million contract extension in 2003. As in all NFL player contracts, there's specific signing bonus forfeiture language in Urlacher's contract. If he's in default by missing a mandatory activity, the club could choose to deal with him in similar fashion to the way the Denver Broncos pursued fines and forfeitures with AWOL wide receiver Ashley Lelie two summers ago.

So it's not that the Bears could fine Urlacher $5.7 million for missing minicamp, but they could seek to withhold the money for violating the terms of his contract. I can't imagine it would come to that -- or that any arbiter would side with the organization on the matter -- but symbolically, it could have long-lasting implications.

Generally, NFL players don't respond well to losing out on several million bucks they had coming their way, The team contends it doesn't negotiate with players not in camp (they extended kicker Robbie Gould after he finally decided to show up) so this could drag on for a while.

Currently, the Bears have a one-year, $18 million extension on the table, but Urlacher, "coming off neck surgery and dealing with an arthritic back", wants more.

Hopefully, Briggs will be able to shed some light on when the stalemate will end.

Lance Briggs sure does know a lot about teammate Brian Urlacher. So much, in fact, that he'd probably make a good agent after this NFL thing runs its course. Two weeks ago, Briggs informed us all that Urlacher deserved a new contract. And today, appearing on "NFL Live", Briggs brought us up to speed on Urlacher's pending vacation plans.

Briggs, who had his own contract issue with the Bears' brass in the past, says he doesn't expect Urlacher at the team's minicamp this weekend.

"He's not going to be there. I'm pretty sure he's not going to be there, and it's sad it got to this point. This should be handled behind closed doors, and all they should say is 'Brian Urlacher has a new deal,' and we move on with business."

As Hashmarks' Bill Williamson writes, Briggs is the poster dude for Bears-related contract disputes, although, in the end, he re-upped with the team after there wasn't much demand for his services (and the salary that went along with it) in free agency.

That aside, Briggs is right about one thing: this probably would've been better handled without help from the media. Ultimately, though, I don't think it'll much matter. If the Bears get close to what Urlacher wants, it'll all be forgotten as soon as the new deal is signed.

If the two sides can't reach an agreement, Urlacher may pull a "Briggs" and hold out for a while before finally showing up. Not getting a paycheck has a way of helping people make up their minds.

Rex Grossman may not be inclined to discuss Brian Urlacher's contract situation but Lance Briggs is. Freed from fathering his brood for a trip to Wrigley where he threw out the first pitch, sang "Take Me Out to the Ballgame" and delivered a plea for his linebacking brother-in-arms.

"I don't think it should be an issue. I think everybody in the city of Chicago knows what Brian Urlacher has meant and continues to mean to the city of Chicago. Whatever is going on, I believe it will be worked out. He is definitely due. He has outlived that contract, and I'm the biggest supporter of my big brother."

Color me shocked. A guy who just signed a contract that he's already unhappy with and, like Urlacher, is skipping workouts thinks that a guy who entered, willingly and alertly, into a nine-year deal should get a new one. I was really expecting Briggs to side with management in this case. Just when I thought I had all the answers, Briggsie, you changed the questions!

And, while we're at it, can we drop the what he means to the city business? If civic pride is going to play a role in these things it has to work both ways. "Well, he means so much to the city, we've got to pay him more" makes no more sense than "He should care so much about the city that he'll play for nothing." Both are silly appeals to something that has nothing to do with the question at hand.

You can't really fault Rex Grossman for not wanting to rock the boat. He was fortunate enough to get a one-year extension, and since he's not guaranteed the starting gig (for once, thankfully), he's wisely choosing to avoid topics that might make his employer sad. Like, say, Brian Urlacher's unhappiness with his current contract.

The Chicago Tribune's Vaughn McClure caught up with Grossman at a charity bowling event and apparently it was a wasted trip:

The quarterback was asked about a guy such as Brian Urlacher holding out of voluntary workouts and likely mini-camp.

"That doesn't affect me at all," he said. "I'm going about my business. I'm doing everything I can to make sure I'm the best football player I can be. In the end, it will all work itself out [for them]. That has nothing to do with me. I'm at Halas Hall working hard."

Wow. That's straight out of the Bill Belichick Guide to Providing Non-Answers to Dumb Media Questions. But like I said, I can't blame Grossman for avoiding the conversation altogether. He's got more important things to worry about -- like finding a way to not lose a quarterback competition to Canton-bound Kyle Orton. The decidedly bleak outlook at wide receiver helps no one, but credit to Grossman for putting on a happy face about the whole thing:

"You can tell that everybody is hungry at the wide receiver position. Devin Hester, Mark Bradley, Rashied Davis, all these guys have become better, and you can see it already. I'm excited about training camp."

And if Grossman keeps repeating it, maybe he'll actually believe it by August. (Crosses fingers)

It shouldn't come as any surprise that the lack of any movement toward a new contract for Brian Urlacher hasn't affected his resolve to secure one for himself. The Bears linebacker told Michael Silver of Yahoo! Sports that he's probably going to skip the team's mandatory minicamp at the end of the month.

He also laid out his reasons for wanting a new contract even though he's got four years left on his current deal. The salary cap's gone up, he argues, and he's done a good job so he should get more money.

"It's easy for people to criticize me for wanting (a new deal), and I understand that it's a contract and I signed it. But this is the NFL, and if I'd signed it and I'd played like (expletive), they'd have cut me or tried to get me to take less. In my mind, there's no difference. If they can 'break' a contract, I have a right to ask for more if I play well enough."

He's right, he's got a right to ask. His issues with the system, though, aren't with the Bears, they're with the Collective Bargaining Agreement between the NFL and the NFLPA. Any inequity is a byproduct of that deal in general, not Urlacher's in particular. It also means a new contract wouldn't offer any more protection against getting cut, just a lump sum in the form of a signing bonus which, I suspect, is his only real concern.

Bears' general manager Jerry Angelo is known for his frugalness. And that's an issue for linebacker Brian Urlacher, who's looking for a new deal. Problem is, Angelo thinks the contract extension currently on offer is sufficient.

[Angelos'] message was clear and brief enough to text to Urlacher in Arizona: Angelo won't budge. If the Bears' defensive line was this stout, they wouldn't have to worry about keeping All-Pro linebackers happily in the fold.

That's sure to speed along negotiations, I'd think. Angelo probably didn't intend it, but is kinda sounds like he's saying the front four have a lot to do with the linebackers' success, and you could stick anybody in there and expect similar results. Or maybe I'm reading too much into his words.

Either way, the Chicago Tribune's David Haugh keeps it all in perspective:

What you heard Tuesday from Angelo came off as predictable, understandable spin - a negotiation tactic in response to Urlacher going public to the Tribune with his displeasure.

"Fifty-three people want to be treated special," Angelo said. "How in the heck would we be able to run a business if we acquiesce to every situation from every player when they come to us? It's just not practical."

No one -- not even Angelo -- believes this, of course. Special players get special treatment all the time. I'm not positive, but I think it has something to do with them being special. Unlike Lance Briggs, who's a good player but replaceable, losing Urlacher would be a blow to the defense. And for a team with very little margin for error (see: offense), that's sort of a big deal.

I'm guessing this all gets worked out.