Richard Sherman wasn’t at the Seattle Seahawks headquarters for the start of the team’s offseason conditioning work. That’s because it is voluntary.
Garry Gilliam wasn’t there, either, on Tuesday. That’s because he now plays for the San Francisco 49ers.
A league source confirmed to The News Tribune that Sherman was absent as Seattle began conditioning and physical rehabilitation work at its team headquarters on Tuesday. It’s the first phase of the Seahawks’ offseason workouts that include rookie minicamps following next week’s draft, veteran organized team activities beginning May 30 and a minicamp for all in June. Only the last event, the minicamp June 13-15, is mandatory.
The Seahawks don’t customarily confirm attendance at voluntary offseason events, nor do they make players available to the media during the conditioning phase.
SI.com reported Tuesday morning Sherman plans to report in early to mid May, before OTAs begin.
It’s easy to jump to conclusions about Sherman, whose home is in Maple Valley, staying away from these team workouts down the road in Renton. That’s because of all the trade talk the Seahawks have oddly, openly detailed this offseason about their three-time All-Pro cornerback.
But what Sherman is doing by staying away mirrors what teammates Michael Bennett, Kam Chancellor, Marshawn Lynch and others have done before him. He is making whatever statement — or at the minimum, avoiding whatever he can — while he can. As in, before it would begin costing him money.
Teams can fine players who miss any mandatory offseason or preseason work, but not any defined as voluntary by the league’s collective bargaining agreement.
Whatever the upshot of all the weird trade talk and staying away from workouts in April, he can clearly see, for the first time, the end of his fantastic run in Seattle. The Seahawks can, too. Sherman, 29, has two seasons and $22,431,000 remaining on his four-year, $56 million contract.
Gilliam was guaranteed a mere $12,000 when he entered the NFL. Such is the life of an undrafted rookie free agent with an uncertain, after unlikely, career.
So when San Francisco offered the Seahawks’ restricted free agent and starting right tackle the last two seasons $2.2 million with $1.4 million guaranteed for 2017 on Monday, it was a no-brainer for Gilliam. The 26-year old lived at a boarding school starting at age seven through high school, to escape a dead-end upbringing in Harrisburg, Pennsylvania.
It was also a no-brainer for Seattle.
Agent Mark Clouser confirmed Tuesday to The News Tribune the Seahawks declined to match the 49ers’ offer for Gilliam. So Gilliam went to the Bay Area to sign his contract that makes him San Francisco’s new right tackle. He has $1.4 million more guaranteed than he would have gotten from the Seahawks, including San Francisco’s six-figure signing bonus that will in his bank account by month’s end.
“Seattle doesn’t particularly re-up their offensive linemen on long-term deals,” Clouser said, accurately.
Last month the Seahawks gave Gilliam the lowest tender to keep him as a restricted free agent: a non-guaranteed, $1,797,000 salary for 2017, with no draft-pick compensation should he sign somewhere else. That was a tepid attempt at insurance, in case they needed him after trying to remake their line. Seattle’s quick decision not to match the 49ers’ offer — they had five days to decide but took only one — cemented Seahawks general manager John Schneider’s stated intent to move Germain Ifedi from their starting right guard in 2016 to right tackle this year.
Ifedi, Seattle’s first-round pick last year, played right tackle at Texas A&M before the Seahawks drafted him 31st overall.
Clouser said the 49ers offered his client a three-year, front-loaded deal last week after Gilliam visited with San Francisco’s new coach Kyle Shanahan and new general manager John Lynch. When Gilliam declined that, Clouser said, San Francisco countered with a two-year deal with more money front loaded. Gilliam and Clouser didn’t want to give up any of the player’s years in unrestricted free agency, so they declined the two-year deal, as well. The 49ers persisted, countering again with a one-year deal guaranteeing him the $1.4 million.
The total possible value is a raise of more than 300 percent from the $600,000 Gilliam made as Seattle’s starting tackle last season.
Gilliam’s guaranteed million is incredible considering how he got not just into the NFL but to college.
His mother, Thelma “Vene” Shifflett, raised Garry and his special needs older brother, Victor, by herself in the crime-filled Hill neighborhood of Harrisburg, Pennsylvania’s capital city. To give Garry a future she didn’t think she could provide as a single mother in such a long-odds place, Shifflett sent Garry away 25 miles from the Hill when he was seven years old, alone, to Milton Hershey School.
The 107-year-old establishment is free for students in pre-kindergarten through 12th grade from families of low income and long odds. It is named after the man who set aside a trust for its creation, the American chocolatier for whom the city where the school is located is named.
Gilliam lived year-round at Milton Hershey School from second grade through his high school graduation. He lived in groups of three or four similarly aged children cared for by a hosting, married house-couple, doing household chores at or before dawn, before classes and sports practices.
Through endowments, each student who successfully makes it through 12th grade at Milton Hershey gets a college scholarship. Gilliam is the first in his family to attend college.
After he was there some time, his mother moved closer to the school so Garry could see her on weekends. Other than that, he’s been on his own since second grade.
“It was definitely a strange place and strange people at seven years old,” Gilliam said a couple years ago, chuckling.
On his own has a different meaning now. After he made the Seahawks and stuck for three years, the last two as a starter, Gilliam bought a house in Renton. He is only the second person to make it through both Milton Hershey and college to play in the NFL. Joe Senser graduated from Milton Hershey in 1974 and played tight end for the Minnesota Vikings.
Now Gilliam’s a millionaire. Guaranteed.
“I think he’s made more money than guys in that draft class that went in the second round,” Clouser said.
“It’s a miracle. And, yeah, it’s about time to give him some guaranteed money.
“He’s definitely a special kid.”
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