Case for Jadevon Clowney, but why it won't happen...

[Catufb85]

Jadevon Clowney was one of the most college prepared defensive ends to ever come out of high school and was one of the most prolific defensive ends to come out of college going #1 overall to the Texans.  He has a one year deal worth $15million with the Texans but that relationship has all but signed the divorce papers.  Clowney has never registered more than 9 sacks in a single season and in 5 years only has 29 total sacks.    He is portraying and screaming to the NFL that his contract is up he wants one of not only a defensive players highest paid contract but overall highest paid NFL player contracts.  

He case is luke warm in the sense because inflation and prices go up, I mean the top 10 highest paid quarterbacks the top 3 Stafford, Cousins, and Luck haven't faired well in playoffs or sniffed a Super Bowl.  https://expo.cleveland.com/sports/g66l-2019/07/067d3fdb107068/nfls-highestpaid-quarterbacks-and-the-besttoworst-values-for-2019.html

We all know a healthy Clowney's presence on an already ferocious defense would be.  No one is saying he couldn't immediately step on the field and be one of the most feared out there.  However, IMO he can't immediately demand to the be highest paid defender in the NFL when you haven't produced the numbers.

Now, the Panthers have no where near the money to support even a 1 year 15million contract if there was a trade.  However, in most trade situations a trade is made and finalized with the recipient team able to re-negotiate a deal.   We all know in the backdoor scheme of thinks like bonus money, workout bonuses, production bonuses, etc.  that there is ways to make numbers work for you.

The Panthers did spend a 1st round pick on Burns which looks to pan out like one of there better picks for us in quite some time (of course CMC being the best probably in a long long time) but opposite of Brian Burns you have a 31 year old Bruce Irvin on the downward slope and a Mario Addison who is also 31 years old.  You have Shaq and Luke who will hopefully tie up the middle of that 3-4 defense who a long time.  But outside of Burns with the inexperience of Haynes, Christian Miller, and the other young linebackers wouldn't take a genius to realize how opposing our defense would be with Burns and Clowney rushing the ends.

Hypothetcial if we traded/cut Gano theres $2 million and if Addison in the plans past this season and being on the last year of his 3 year contract worth and could save about $7 million on top of our about $6.9 million cap space would be roughly $16 million.  A move would work on top of restructuring next year.

All that being sad and the pipedream I had at work while waiting for callbacks, I thought I may look into this.  It won't happen but amaze Clowney in that defense that would lock in our 4 starting linebackers all being below age of 30 for quite some time (pending health of course.)  

Charlotte would boom with a move like that with Clowney being a local celebrity growing up there in Rock Hill then playing for South Carolina.  The four horsemen of Cam, Luke, CMC & Clowney would be kind of cool.

Anyways back to your previously scheduled broadcast. 

Lets go Panthers!  Ready for week 1 where ill be sitting in my section 504 since 1997.

 

 

[ncfan]

There is no case.

 

Edge rusher is arguably the deepest position on the team.  Tied with the WR group jist has vets as well with Addison and Irving.

Clowney has been injured prone 

Clowney is on a franchise tag wanting a top pass rusher deal. 

 

There is literally no argument for him.

For the ones saying we can make cap room for him etc.  

If we can make room, that needs to go right to the OL and backup QB spot, not edge where we have 5 or so rushers.

[WarPanthers89]

Footnotes version:

 

[jfra78]

We good

[CatTower]

This sounds like some Madden pipedream.  In reality, adding Clowney could set this franchise back years.  The added benefit doesn't come close to the unnecessary risk.

[Tepper's Chest Hair]

No team can re-negotiate Clowney's deal after trading for him.

He is unable to sign a new contract until next season.  That is why trading him is so difficult.  Teams don't want to give up assets on a 1 year rental you *hope* you can sign back in a year.

The cut off date for signing someone on a franchise tag to a long term deal has already been passed.  He is on the franchise tag for this season.  Period.

That being said, he is on back to back 9 sack seasons.  While he started slow, he is a beast.  And would drastically improve any defense he joins.

[rayzor]

oh well....never thought there was much of a case for him anyways. that is one position group we have that is already pretty well stacked and not an issue. bigger problems exist, esp. OL.

[Toomers]

   I wouldn’t sign him as a FA to anything near the 20M/year he wants. Much less trade something of value to get the chance to. 

 And everything ncfan said.....

[Bartin]

We have $5.9M in cap space according to the most recent NFL memo.

Addison saves $7.5M and Gano saves $1.15M in cap room to cut

Clowney’s cap number is $15.9M

Still not enough. Would have to restructure someone and push money forward into future years.

Dumb idea, he can’t stay healthy and has never had double digit sacks. But sure let’s give him $20M/year. Seems like a great plan.

[rippadonn]

Only IF Clowney himself REALLY wanted to be and always dreamed of playing for the Panthers.

Guys got agents and much like Kemba getting much less to play where you want to is some sort of disrespect.

If it wasn't all about the money and all about love Clowney would take less money to play for his hometown, especially since they now practice in his city but as we see with Kemba 150mill may not be enough :-/

They way Hurndog has been drafting, I'd assume he just may go after another high value end to pair with Burns. Marty has been $ in the first so if we need one drafting another good one may be the best move, especially if they can hit on another Burns level DE.