Agent’s statement shows not all is ‘copacetic’
There are a number of miserable things to wake up to on a Monday morning. A leaking hot water heater, a dead battery, a spam call. But Cardinals fans experienced a new one on the last day of February:
AN ALL-CAPS, SINGLESPACED 500-OR-SO-WORD STATEMENT FROM ERIK BURKHARDT, KYLER MURRAY’S AGENT, RELEASED THROUGH ESPN’S ADAM SCHEFTER AT 6:40 AM LOCAL TIME, THAT BASICALLY SAYS IF THE CARDINALS ARE SERIOUS ABOUT WINNING, THEY WILL PAY MURRAY NOW.
We started our day with a word salad that was more a manifesto than a statement, to which the Cardinals first response should be: Use a portion of the fees you charge to represent Murray and coach Kliff Kingsbury to hire a graphic designer and a copy editor and then we will talk.
Once the dizziness cleared, a realization settled in: The Cardinals and Murray are at a rocky point in their relationship.
It’s not a creation of the media but of money. Murray and Burkhardt are pushing for an extension, and the Cardinals, well, they aren’t saying much other than owner Michael Bidwill’s comment last week about Murray: “Put me in the corner of ‘I love him,’ and ‘I know he’s going to get better.’ ”
That has the makings of a country song, and the Murray/ Cardinals relationship is playing out like one.
The Cardinals season ended only about six weeks ago. In that time, Murray has scrubbed his social media of many items, including nearly everything to do with the Cardinals. That was followed by reports on Super Bowl Sunday that the Cardinals wanted Murray to improve his body language and leadership skills, and that Murray felt like he was being made a scapegoat for the Cardinals’ late-season failures.
Then last week, the Cardinals
told us there wasn’t much to see here, that they loved Kyler and assumed he loved them back. NFL Network’s Jane Slater reported that “everything was copacetic” between the team and quarterback.
Judging by Burkhardt’s statement, that apparently is not true.
In both timing and content, it was bizarre.
The season, Murray’s third, ended Jan. 17. Under collective bargaining agreement rules, the Cardinals weren’t allowed to extend Murray’s contract before then, which means Burkhardt is taking negotiations public, sort of, after just six weeks?
These deals most often are completed in the summer. Jared Goff, now with the Lions, signed an extension with the Rams in September 2019. Chiefs quarterback Patrick Mahomes signed his extension in July 2020. Bills quarterback Josh Allen signed his last August.
It seems the only reason for Burkhardt to make a case publicly
for an extension this early is that the Cardinals are disinclined to sign Murray before he begins his fourth season. And if they exercise his fifth-year option, which should be a given, they will have him under contract for two more years. What’s the rush in signing him to a deal that will average in the neighborhood of $45 million a year?
It’s a sensible argument, especially since the Cardinals faltered badly at the most critical times the last two seasons.
In all-caps, Burkhardt presented the reasons. The deal he proposed would lower Murray’s cap figures this year and next, he wrote, giving the Cardinals more space to use in free agency. With Murray starting, the Cardinals’ record has improved each year and they made the playoffs this year for the first time since the 2015 season. He won rookie of the year honors and has been to two Pro Bowls.
Those are persuasive arguments.
Where Burkhardt veers off
course is trying to persuade us that signing Murray to an extension soon is a referendum on the Cardinals’ desire to win. The team could make a well-reasoned argument that waiting at least a year to pay Murray again is the prudent thing to do.
They were, after all, 0-for-2 in 2020 in games in which a victory would have clinched a playoff berth. They were 0-3 in those games in 2021 and then were blown out by the Rams in the playoffs six weeks ago.
That’s a 0-6 record in the biggest games of the last two seasons.
Murray, 24, does need to improve his body language. His leadership skills can improve. The Cardinals need to win more games in December and January. It’s fair for Bidwill and the Cardinals to believe all that can happen, and also to spend money elsewhere until it does.
The disagreement about Murray’s current value is to be expected. An agent’s job is to get his client paid, sooner rather than later. And owners don’t want to spend big money until and unless they have to.
What’s perplexing is Burkhardt choosing to go public with it just six weeks after negotiations could start. That’s barely long enough for everyone to clear their throats.
What’s clear is this story isn’t going away anytime soon. Let’s just hope that if someone feels the need to issue another statement, it’s lower-cased and double-spaced.