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Dolphins News: Three Re-Sign
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Dolphins News: Three Re-Sign
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*** DOLPHINS NEWS ***
Apr 13, 1999: -- Three Re-Sign --

The Dolphins re-signed restricted free agents Kareem Abdul-Jabbar, Shane Burton and Stanley Pritchett to one year contracts today. All three signed contracts for the one year tender offer that the Dolphins made to keep them as restricted free agents.

The signing of these three players leaves the team with only 2 restricted free agents left to sign - OJ Brigance and Shawn Wooden.

My Comments:

The timing and nature of these signings is very curious. First of all, JJ generally doesn't like to sign players to short term deals, especially if he is going to use them in the future.

Secondly, the draft is just 4 days away and JJ would like to move up in the draft to get a super quality running back - of which there are only 2 available this year.

At least, that's what the pundits tell us.

But if the pundits are right, then JJ will have to have some decent trade bait and he doesn't have enough decent draft picks this year to really move up to the top ten, let alone the top 5 or 6.

That is - if he is only going to trade draft picks.

Could this be a preliminary move to a blockbuster trade deal on draft day? While that is still unlikely, it's a lot more possible this year than it's been in any year since JJ took over the Dolphins.

Shifting to wet-blanket mode now, these three players could just have decided to take the Dolphins' offers so that they can play out their remaining restricted year with the Dolphins and become free agents next year. Of course, all three would have to have very good years this year in order to command a big price next year as free agents, but in signing one year deals, they will be unrestricted free agents next season.

And the timing isn't really all that curious. The deadline for these players to accept offer sheets from other teams has just passed, so there is no chance at this point that anyone else is going to try to sign them away from the Dolphins.

So I expect that the bottom line is that each player decided to sign their one year offer and play out this season so that they can become free agents next year.

Still - it is fun to speculate, isn't it?

Related Info:


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Curt Fennell, curt@phins.com, DOLFAN in New Rochelle (almost)
     
   

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Curt Fennell
curt@phins.com
DOLFAN in New England