Maybe this is why Bryant Gumbel tore Gene Upshaw a backhanded new one awhile back. ESPN's Len Pasquarelli has an interesting piece about franchising tagging from the viewpoint of the players. It can be stated that they're none too happy with it.
Walter Jones, who managed to remain a Seahawk with a bizarre series of year-by-year contracts until we had the good sense to wrap him up on a multi-year deal, gives the most pointed quote in the piece:
All personal (and admittedly cliched) feelings about people making salaries much larger than my own aside, I agree with Walter. Whatever it means for the hometown team, the designation system is creating a skewed reality between year-in-year-out talents, and the flashes in the pan who can get outsized deals they may not deserve. It's a schemata that needs some tinkering. What are your thoughts?
I gotta go franchise my (would-be) in-laws for dinner.