Robert Griffin III: The System is 'Broken' if Daniel Jones Gets $40 Million Per Year

The New York Giants have until 4 p.m. ET today to reach an agreement with Daniel Jones, otherwise they'll be forced to use the franchise tag on their young quarterback. A deal has not been made by now in part because it is rather tricky to nail down Jones' true value. He made it clear he can play winning football and help lead a team to the postseason last year. Yet only two years ago he was universally considered a bust. There is nobody who believes he's is a top-10 QB in the league and maybe not even top-15. You'll be hard-pressed to find a pundit willing to argue he could turn into a great quarterback anytime soon.

So now you understand why the question of how much he should get paid is tricky indeed. The contracts of Derek Carr and Geno Smith, both signed yesterday, are helpful in gauging Jones' value because they're in the same tier of quarterback as Jones (good enough to win games, still a step below the true stars of the position). Smith's new deal will pay him $35 million annually while Carr's comes in at $37.5 million per year. Jones' team will point to those numbers as the bare minimum he should be making on his new deal, and will probably argue for more since he's much younger than both.

Robert Griffin III thinks the whole system is "broken" if Jones ends up with a deal worth that much.

First off, it feels weird that Griffin is pushing the opinion that football players should make less. You know, since he is not only a former player but one whose earnings potential was burned to the ground thanks to a coach pushing him to play through injury. You'd think a guy in that position would be rooting for his fellow players to make their money, but maybe it's just some envy since his career earnings of $33 million is less than what any of the three names mentioned will make in 2023.

Secondly, this is just... how capitalism works? It sure can suck for us normal people but if you are a person with an in-demand skillset and there are people willing to pay enormous sums for that skillset, you're going to make a ton of money. Does it seem a little ridiculous that Jones is going to make $40 million annually? Yes, it does. In a vacuum. But there's more money to go around every year and the QB position somehow manages to just keep increasing in value. This is the result.

If Griffin's primary point is that the contract of a quarterback should reflect how good they actually are then there are better places to direct his ire. Like, say, Cleveland, where Deshaun Watson got the type of contract not even Patrick Mahomes could get (after getting accused of heinous actions by literally dozens of women on top of it all) and played like a bottom-10 QB all year. There are better examples of the flaws in this system.