Breaking Down Andrew Luck's Monster Six-Year, $140 Million Contract

Andrew Luck is now the highest-paid player in NFL history as he agreed to an enormous new contract with the Indianapolis Colts on Wednesday. The 26-year-old’s deal will last six years and pay him almost $140 million. But as we all know, NFL contracts aren’t always what they seem on the surface, so here’s a breakdown of what Luck will actually be earning and when.

First, to clarify, this is not a five-year extension for Luck. He instead signed a new six-year deal, which means he’ll get to play for more money this season instead of waiting for the new contract to kick in. That’s huge, because the Stanford product was set to make $16.155 million this season after the team exercised its fifth-year option on him. He’ll now get a raise of roughly $9 million.

The new contract carries with it $87 million in guarantees. That breaks down as: $60 million fully guaranteed by March of 2017, $81 million by March of 2018 and $87 million by March of 2019. Since there is zero chance the Colts cut him before then, the $87 million is essentially fully guaranteed.

Luck will make $75 million over the first three years of the new deal, and he’ll reportedly get a $32 million signing bonus and $47 million fully guaranteed at signing.

Luck’s new contract has officially broken several NFL records. His $87 million in guaranteed money dwarfs the previous high of $65 million Eli Manning and Philip Rivers received. The $140 million total is the highest the league has ever seen by $30 million. The previous high was the $110 million Aaron Rodgers got from the Green Bay Packers in 2013. Additionally, the average annual value of Luck’s new contract will be right around $23.3 million. The previous high was the $22.1 million Joe Flacco received from the Baltimore Ravens in March.

On top of all the positives for Luck, with this deal he’s scheduled to hit free agency again at 32, when he should still be in the tail end of his prime. So while most quarterbacks get a shot at one big contract, if he performs, he should be in line for a second monster deal.

To sum up: It was a good day to be Andrew Luck and his beard. But it was probably a bad day for his flip phone, which he can now finally afford to upgrade.