Wallace officially a no-show; Steelers suspend negotiations

[squidkid]

I didn't suggest that I knew what the Steelers offered Wallace. I suggested that there are 31 teams that could pay Wallace more. Let me rephrase for you. Whatever amount the Steelers offered Wallace, there are 31 teams that could pay him more.

nice try.
how can you make a statement like that without knowing what the steelers offered and without knowing what every other team in the nfl salary cap situation is?
what if the steelers offered 50 million per year. could all 31 teams afford to pay him 51 million?

[Steelgal]

I have a question. The way I understand it, since Wallace hasn't signed his tender, he can not be fined for not being at camp/games. If he holds out until week 10, like Vincent Jackson did last year, will he get the full $2.6M salary or would it be prorated to the games he's played? Thanks!

[Slapstick]

I have a question. The way I understand it, since Wallace hasn't signed his tender, he can not be fined for not being at camp/games. If he holds out until week 10, like Vincent Jackson did last year, will he get the full $2.6M salary or would it be prorated to the games he's played? Thanks!

Pro-rated...

[hawaiiansteel]

Steelers sign Antonio Brown

Updated: July 27, 2012
ESPN.com news services

Wide receiver Antonio Brown signed a five-year contract extension Friday with the Pittsburgh Steelers. The deal is worth $42.5 million, a league source told ESPN NFL Insider Adam Schefter.

Brown, voted Pittsburgh's most valuable player by teammates last season, was entering the final season of the three-year contract he signed when he was drafted out of Central Michigan in 2010. He would have been eligible for restricted free agency after this season.

Brown made the Pro Bowl last season after becoming the first player in NFL history with at least 1,000 receiving yards and at least 1,000 return yards (1,062). He finished second on the team to Mike Wallace with 69 receptions for 1,108 yards.

"He has played a major role in our success over the past two years," Steelers general manager Kevin Colbert said, "and we are thrilled he will be a Steeler for many years to come."

Steelers Nation had been eagerly anticipating a long-term extension for one of its young receivers, but it was expected to have been Wallace. The late-day announcement of Brown's deal came as a surprise Friday, less than two hours after the Steelers wrapped up their second day of practice.

A restricted free agent unhappy with the $2.7 million tender the team extended for this season, Wallace did not report to St. Vincent College with the rest of his teammates on Wednesday.

Talks between the team and Wallace have broken off, and the Steelers don't plan to talk contract until the wide receiver reports to camp, a source told ESPN.com senior writer John Clayton on Wednesday.

"I'm looking forward for him to be here, get all hands on deck," Brown said Wednesday, "and get everybody moving in the right direction so we can embark on what we can embark on."

Brown said he speaks with Wallace regularly, but that he has not been pressuring him to report and join his teammates.

"We talk about personal things, but his business is his business," Brown said Thursday. "I'm pretty sure he'll take care of it, and when he gets here, we'll embrace him."

Brown's deal could affect Wallace's ability to cash in. The Steelers are up against the salary cap and -- with the exception of Hines Ward -- have been historically averse to giving big contracts to wide receivers. Two years ago, when Brown and Emmanuel Sanders were rookies, Wallace dubbed the threesome the "Young Money Crew."



Brown beat Wallace in the race to cash.

The first time Brown touched the ball in an NFL regular season game, he returned the opening kickoff for a touchdown at Tennessee on Sept. 19, 2010. He only dressed for nine regular season games as a rookie, catching 16 passes. The kickoff return was his lone touchdown, while Wallace enjoyed a breakout campaign of 1,257 yards and 10 touchdowns.

But Brown began to emerge during the playoffs, catching three passes for 75 yards in a divisional round win over Baltimore. His 58-yard reception in the final two minutes -- one he secured by holding the ball up against his helmet -- set up the winning touchdown.

Brown entered last season as Pittsburgh's No. 4 receiver but became quarterback Ben Roethlisberger's go-to guy over the second half. Brown had 51 catches for 846 yards over the final 10 games of the season.

"Definitely, I can get better," Brown said at the end of last season. "I continue to get stronger."

Brown will meet the media to discuss the new deal on Saturday.

[URL]http://espn.go.com/nfl/story/_/id/8207145/source-pittsburgh-steelers-lock-wr-antonio-brown-5-year-425-million-deal[/URL]

[fezziwig]

Hawain, nice pics of the three coaches. We must be the only NFL team that have had consecutive coaches (3) to win Super Bowls. That's got to be a trivia question.

[hawaiiansteel]

Ed: Trading Wallace Best for Both Sides

SATURDAY, 28 JULY 2012 WRITTEN BY ED BOUCHETTE

Good morning,

It makes more sense than ever for Mike Wallace to sign his one-year tender, get into training camp and play the entire 2012 season. After all, it is his final dress rehearsal for his next employer for 2013.

The Steelers did more than sign a good, young receiver when Antonio Brown committed to them through the 2017 season. They lowered the kaboom on Wallace. There was little chance they were going to give into Wallace’s contract demands before they signed Brown; there is no chance now.

That doesn’t mean a multiple-year contract is no longer available to Wallace. It very well could be. But the number offered by the Steelers before AB would likely be reduced dramatically, that is if negotiations even resume with Wallace on a multiple-year deal.

A sign-and-trade remains a possibility, but the Steelers do not like to go that route because it might set a precedent for a player or players to force trades similarly in the future. However, a trade technically can happen and the scenario would look like this: The Steelers give another team or teams permission to talk to Wallace to try to work out a deal. If they do, Wallace would sign his one-year tender with the Steelers, who then would trade him to the other team.

What could they get for Wallace at this point? No team apparently was willing to give up a first-round draft choice for him when he was a restricted free agent, so why would they do it now? Santonio Holmes, remember, brought them only a fifth-round pick. I’m guessing with Wallace, it could be a fourth-rounder.

Do you do that trade? I think the Steelers have reached a point that they might. They now view Wallace as a potential distraction – not his holdout, but if he ever ends it. He not only slumped in the second half of last season, but so did his attitude and they would assume if he had to sign the one-year deal and was unable to get a longer deal from the Steelers to his satisfaction, that attitude would not improve this season.

This looked to be the most ill-advised holdout since Franco Harris in 1984, and the fallout from that. However, Harris was at the end of the road and the Steelers were willing to give him one final season – they even put him on the cover of their press guide that year, an honor they almost never do for a player or coach. Wallace is only in his fourth season.

If the Steelers do trade Wallace over the next month or so, the holdout could be seen as a victory for the player because he will have gotten big money, only elsewhere. If that happens, the Steelers will have lost one of the league’s best big-play receivers. However, they really never had a choice because they were never going to pay Wallace the kind of money he wanted and it appears he was not going to accept much less.

I’ve written here and said it on radio and TV since the spring that I thought they never would come to a long-term deal with Wallace, that he would have to sign the one-year tender, play this season and enter free agency next March. I did not think a trade could happen. Wallace could try to encourage a trade by not reporting to training camp, and the Steelers could do nothing and let him sit. But once the season begins, if he continues to hold out, neither side gains anything.

The only good way out of this for both sides would be for the Steelers to trade Mike Wallace.

[URL]https://plus.sites.post-gazette.com/index.php/pro-sports/steelers/117381-ed-trading-wallace-best-for-both-sides[/URL]

[steelz09]

If the Steelers want to trade Wallace, I would want a current player such as a S or nothing less than a 2nd round pick

[hawaiiansteel]

Doubts grow that Mike Wallace has a future in Pittsburgh

Posted by Michael David Smith on July 28, 2012



What does the long-term contract extension for Steelers receiver Antonio Brown mean for the future of the Steelers’ other starting receiver, Mike Wallace?

It may mean Wallace and the Steelers have no future together.

After Brown signed his deal, Steelers beat writer Ed Bouchette of the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette wrote that there won’t be a new deal for Wallace. In other words, the Steelers are telling Wallace that his options are to sign his one-year tender and play this season for $2.7 million, or not to play at all.

If Wallace does sign that one-year tender, he’d become an unrestricted free agent a year from now. At that point, the Steelers could use the franchise tag to keep him, but Bouchette writes that there’s “no way” the Steelers will franchise Wallace. In other words, the Steelers have pretty much resigned themselves to getting one more year out of Wallace, and then letting him move on.

But will they even get another year out of Wallace? Not necessarily, according to Gerry Dulac of the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette, who writes that the Steelers could trade Wallace in training camp.

That one is harder to picture. First of all, a trade would only happen if there’s a team out there willing both to meet Wallace’s contract demands and to give up compensation that the the Steelers are willing to accept. But if Wallace is really looking for Larry Fitzgerald money, as has been reported, there’s probably not a team out there willing to meet his contract demands. And it’s not clear whether any team is willing to give up the kind of compensation the Steelers would accept: We know no team is going to give up a first-round pick for Wallace because any team could have had him for a first-round pick at any time during the offseason, and no team signed him to an offer sheet. A team might tempt the Steelers with an offer of a second-round pick, but the Steelers could just decide they’d rather have one more year of Wallace’s services, especially considering that the Steelers would get a compensatory pick if Wallace leaves in free agency next year.

In other words, there aren’t many options for Wallace right now. His best bet seems to be signing the tender, having another strong season, and hoping unrestricted free agency goes better for him next year than restricted free agency went for him this year.

[URL]http://profootballtalk.nbcsports.com/2012/07/28/doubts-grow-that-mike-wallace-has-a-future-in-pittsburgh/[/URL]

[Oviedo]

If the Steelers want to trade Wallace, I would want a current player such as a S or nothing less than a 2nd round pick

I agree. We don't need to drag this Wallace nonsense into Week 10. Make him a final offer and if he balk find a trading partner.

[squidkid]

I agree. We don't need to drag this Wallace nonsense into Week 10. Make him a final offer and if he balk find a trading partner.

i would have to assume the steelers already let wallace and his agent know that this is their final offer and if he chooses not to sign it, or sign the tender and report to camp, that their would be no further talks and the deal would be pulled.
this organization seems to have the track record of doing things the right way and being fair to the players that deserve it. sometimes too loyal. i dont think wallace needs another 'fina' final offer. he had his chance.