No mystery to Cleveland Browns why Patriots assistants fail to match Belichick
Danny Shelton gets a 4-time pay raise from Matt Patricia’s Lions
A very similar experiment was repeated for lineman Danny Shelton. As a first-round draft pick by the Browns, his rookie deal paid him $2.9 Million per year for four years. He apparently wanted out of Cleveland and was traded by the Browns to New England for his fourth year.
He took a pay cut stay in New England for his fifth year, at a shade over $1 million. That turned out to be a good move, as he earned a Super Bowl ring. For 2020, he was lured to Detroit by Matt Patricia and company, who raised his pay to two years at $4.0 million per year.
We could argue a little about what Shelton’s true value actually is. It’s possible that Ray Farmer, Browns general manager du jour, slightly over-valued Shelton because of the organization’s long-standing fascination with sack numbers. At the University of Washington, Shelton had accumulated an impressive nine sacks as a senior, mainly against overmatched lesser opponents.
However, there are 25 glaciers at beautiful Mount Rainier National Park, located not far from campus. Most of those glaciers move faster than Shelton. His run-stopping ability translated to the NFL, but not the sacks (4.5 in his NFL career). What Shelton excels at is Mano a Mano combat in the middle of the line, sealing off the middle and forcing the running game to detour to the outside. Make no mistake, Shelton is an excellent staring defensive lineman, but probably should have been taken a few spots later in the first round.
Still there’s no possible way that Shelton could be worth as little as $1 million for a one-year deal in 2019. That was crazy. Shelton’s deal was negotiated by Jeff Sperbeck of The NOVO Agency, according to Spotrac, which was reportedly merging with Rep 1 Sports. Perhaps that process made it hard for Sperback to get his best deal.
Shelton knew he was worth more money, so the following season he hired superstar negotiator Drew Rosenhaus, who has the reputation of being just as tough as Belichick at the negotiating table. Ex-Patriots defensive coordinator and current (but soon to be fired) head coach Matt Patricia of the Detroit Lions valued Shelton’s services very highly. Consequently, the Lions came away from the negotiating table battered and bruised and $8 million poorer after signing Shelton to a two-year deal. So it may be that the choice of agent had something to do with the enormous differential in valuation as well.
It bears mention that there is at least one counterexample. Jason McCourty was paid $43 Million for six years by the Tennessee Titans ($7.1 Million/year), and then signed a two-year deal with the Browns at $6 Million ($3 Million/year), but at his request was traded to New England after only one year. Andy Simms of Young Money APPA Sports negotiated his current contract, $5 million per year for two years.
The main takeway is that Bellichick is a superstar at the negotiating table. A secondary point, however, is that the player’s choice of agent can make a difference of millions of dollars.
Still, if Josh McCown can leave the Browns for the Jets and get close to the same pay as Tom Brady, and if Brian Hoyer is on the same pay scale as Cam Newton, the futility of competing with Belichick at the negotiating table becomes apparent.