Peter King: Branden Albert, Geoff Schwartz, Other Notes
By Ben Nielsen
Oct 20, 2013; Miami Gardens, FL, USA; Buffalo Bills free safety Jairus Byrd (31) in the second quarter of a game against the Miami Dolphins at Sun Life Stadium. Mandatory Credit: Robert Mayer-USA TODAY Sports
Peter King is out with his new edition of Monday Morning Quarterback and used the space to discuss free agency. Within the post he had a few nuggets which may interest Chiefs fans and prepare them for the week ahead.
First, you can also add King to the list of people who have Branden Albert signing a big deal with Miami on Tuesday.
"Ryan Tannehill, meet Brandon Albert. The Dolphins’ new left tackle is expected to be the laid-back Albert. Miami’s expected to blow the opposition out of the water again (remember Mike Wallace and his $13 million average that shocked the NFL last year?) with a deal averaging around $10-11 million."
There’s been a few reports already about Albert ending up with Miami, so this isn’t a surprise. Although King does have a larger contract number than what was previously reported on Albert. No matter, Albert is going to get paid. So much so that we are going to come to the conclusion there is no way the Chiefs were going to be able to retain him even if they wanted to do so.
The other thing to take note of here is what King has to say about free agent free safety Jairus Byrd.
He wants $9 million a year, and I can’t figure out who will pay a safety that much.
Who may pay that much for a free safety? Miami… Cleveland…St. Louis… there are plenty of teams who may be willing to go that high for Byrd’s services. One team who cannot go that high, maybe even with restructures, are the Chiefs. With slightly under $10 million in cap space to work with it is hard to see how the Chiefs would be able to structure a deal that would land them Byrd at a $9 million annual average without killing their cap space in 2015 and beyond. Byrd’s number is going to have to drop to around $7 million at least in KC is going to be a player for his services.
Finally, Geoff Schwartz.
"Best players to make money who you don’t know well. … G/T Geoff Schwartz (Chiefs), versatile and underrated…"
Kansas City cannot afford to overpay anyone. Their cap problem isn’t just this year but also 2015, too. King has him as a guy who is going to get paid and so do several other people around the league, too. If this was next off-season and Schwartz was a free agent then maybe the Chiefs could work something out. This may be a case of bad timing for the Chiefs and Schwartz.
Things could change later today or tomorrow afternoon. Remember, we didn’t find out about Branden Albert being franchised or the Dwayne Bowe contract until the last minute of the franchise tag deadline last March. Things can change in a hurry.