The Seattle Seahawks head into training camp next week with the best roster in football and a dark cloud hanging over the team and its fans.
Not the fateful goal-line pass in Super Bowl XLIX-NOOOO. We’re totally, completely, 100 percent over that. We barely even think about it when we lie awake at night.
No, the dark cloud is Russell Wilson’s desire to be paid close to $25 million per year, and the Seahawks’ desire to pay him less than top dollar.
In our latest poll at HeraldNet.com, we asked what the team should do. “Pay the man” was the leading response, with 46 percent saying he’s worth every penny. Thirty percent said the team should hold out for a better deal, and 24 percent said to trade Wilson to another team. Those voters must be too young to remember the likes of Dan McGwire, Rick Mirer and Kelly Stouffer. Autumn Sundays are a lot less fun when you’re in quarterback purgatory.
Wilson isn’t going anywhere for now. NFL rules allow the team to hold him to his $1.5 million contract this year and then keep him on a one-year contract somewhere near $20 million for 2016. That sounds great if you’re not a pro athlete or Boeing CEO, but it’s only a fraction of what he would get on the open market.
After 2016, he’d likely be able to sign a rich contract with another team, but he understandably wants to be paid sooner. NFL careers are short and 300-pound men try to flatten him every week.
Just pay the man and we can move on to other distractions like Wilson’s hands-off policy with his pop-star girlfriend, Ciara.
If the Seahawks are betting against Wilson’s willpower, it’s a game they’re not going to win.
— Doug Parry, @parryracer
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For our next poll, we’re moving to a more serious topic. After a fatal collapse at the Big Four Ice Caves, what should the Forest Service do?
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