Chargers Hope Pace of Signings Will Start to Pick Up
With the start of Charger training camp 2 1/2 weeks away, the busiest people around pro football these days are expected to be the contract negotiators.
Before the hitting can begin on the field, the number-crunching must be completed off it. The Chargers are no exception.
As many as 27 of the team’s 93 players are unsigned. That includes 12 veterans and 15 of 17 draft choices. Among the unsigned are inside linebacker Junior Seau, the Chargers’ first-round draft choice from USC, and six starters from last season, including defensive leaders such as outside linebacker Leslie O’Neal, cornerback Gill Byrd and free safety Vencie Glenn.
All of this means a busy time for General Manager Bobby Beathard and his staff leading up to the start of training camp at UC San Diego. Beathard is not necessarily expecting to sign all the players by the reporting dates--July 20 for rookies, July 27 for veterans--but he said he does intend to get to as many as possible. No player is allowed to practice without a contract.
“A lot of cases will go down to the wire,” Beathard said. “I hope it doesn’t happen with ours. We would like each guy to get in on time, because it helps his chances of making the squad.”
But even with training camp this near, there appears little urgency on either side. Beathard is taking the week off, although he did say he would stay in touch by phone. And most of the agents representing unsigned Charger clients said it should be another week or so before talks become serious.
“Whatever the word is that is the next word down from slow,” Beathard said. “It’s slower than slow. We have had a lot of conversations with the agents that represent these players; however, no one seems to want to make a move.”
Beathard said the problem is that agents are afraid to make a deal early for fear that another agent will come along later and make a better deal for a player drafted at about the same spot.
“You have a difficult time finding player representatives that are willing to go out and make a deal,” Beathard said. “They want the security of knowing other people have signed.”
Beathard said the deal process is more like “slotting” than negotiating. This is because the value of the contracts tends to fall directly in order of the position in which the player was drafted. Most players get a contract similar to what the player in that same drafted position received last year, plus a generally consistent percentage raise.
For this reason, Beathard said he hopes the signing last week of outside linebacker Jeff Mills, their first of three picks in the third round, will help the Chargers in their dealings with their other third-round choices--offensive tackle Leo Goeas of Hawaii and wide receiver Walter Wilson of East Carolina. Mills and wide receiver Elliott Searcy, the team’s 12th-round choice, are the only two selections announced as signed.
Beathard said the signing of Mills to a three-year contract plus an option year places a ceiling on how much the Chargers will spend on their other third-rounders. Asked if it was possible Goeas or Wilson would receive more than Mills, Beathard replied, “No way.”
Although the agents for Goeas and Wilson might receive some immediate attention, no agent figures to require more of Beathard’s time over the next few weeks than Steve Feldman of Costa Mesa. Feldman represents four unsigned Chargers, all with high profiles: Seau, Byrd, Glenn and quarterback David Archer.
The two have talked several times over the past few weeks, but both sides said they are not close to closing a deal.
“There is nothing you can do except keep talking,” Beathard said.
But while Beathard bemoans the pace of the rookie signings, such agreements league-wide are running at about the same pace they were last season, according to the NFL Management Council. Twenty-seven draft choices have signed, compared to 23 by last July 1. But only seven of those players are in the top four rounds and two--first-rounders Jeff George of Indianpolis and Mark Carrier of Chicago--had agreed to terms by draft day.
About the best news for the Chargers is that their large number of unsigned players has them well below the league roster limit of 80 signed players. Once the Chargers reached 80 signed players, they will have to make cuts. But with only 66 players announced as having signed, that likely will not happen before camp opens for rookies.
Charger Notes
The Chargers will take two trips away from their UC San Diego base before the start of their four-game exhibition schedule Aug. 11 against Dallas at San Diego Jack Murphy Stadium. The Chargers will travel to the Rams’ camp for a scrimmage July 26 and spend Aug. 2-4 training with the Phoenix Cardinals at their camp in Flagstaff, Ariz.
UNSIGNED CHARGERS DRAFT PICKS
Rd. Player Pos. 1 Junior Seau LB 3b Leo Goeas OT 3c Walter Wilson WR 6a John Friesz QB 6b Frank Cornish C 6c David Pool CB 6d Derrick Walker TE 7a Jeff Novak OG 7b Joe Staysniak OT 7c Nate Lewis WR 7d Keith Collins CB 8 J.J. Flannigan RB 9 Chris Goetz OG 10 Ken Berry CB 11 Tommie Stowers HB
VETERANS
Yr. Player Pos. 7 David Archer QB 4 David Brandon LB 8 Gill Byrd CB 8 Arthur Cox TE 3 Cedric Figaro LB 5 Vencie Glenn FS 3 George Hinkle DE 9 Dennis McKnight OG 4 Leslie O’Neal LB 3 David Richards OT 7 Sammy Seale CB 5 Broderick Thompson OT