With the continued wide receiver contract drama in San Francisco and Dallas I wanted to briefly look at one of the big issues that is likely facing the teams and players when negotiating an extension.
The receiver market is plagued with a number of contracts where the team used “real but really fake” years to bloat the annual values of the contracts so that the contracts would seem larger than they really were. While this is something that does happen from time to time across the league this is the only position where it actually has widespread use.
This began back in 2022 when AJ Brown, Davante Adams, and Tyreek Hill all signed contracts valued with very large APY’s but in reality were much smaller. As an example Adams signed a five year contract with the Raiders that averaged $28 million a year, but in reality the odds of earning the last two years of the contract are very slim and the real contract is three years for $22.5 million a season.
Many have mentioned to me when discussing these contracts that as the values of the contracts across the league rise that teams would not hesitate to pay these big salaries but one only has to look at Hill’s recent contract to see how that is not the case. Miami was willing to move some of that money up from the final contract year but not to the level that would make his contract worth $30 million.
Here is what the comparison looks like for the top 11 players at the position.
| Player | Real Years | Real APY | Paper APY | Difference |
| Justin Jefferson | 4 | $35,000,000 | $35,000,000 | $0 |
| AJ Brown | 5 | $28,600,000 | $32,000,000 | -$3,400,000 |
| Jaylen Waddle | 3 | $28,250,000 | $28,250,000 | $0 |
| Amon-Ra St. Brown | 3 | $28,000,000 | $30,002,500 | -$2,002,500 |
| DJ Moore | 4 | $27,500,000 | $27,500,000 | $0 |
| Tyreek Hillk | 2 | $27,000,000 | $30,000,000 | -$3,000,000 |
| Cooper Kupp | 3 | $26,700,000 | $26,700,000 | $0 |
| Devonta Smith | 3 | $25,000,000 | $25,000,000 | $0 |
| Nico Collins | 3 | $24,250,000 | $24,250,000 | $0 |
| DK Metcalf | 3 | $24,000,000 | $24,000,000 | $0 |
| Davante Adams | 3 | $22,500,000 | $28,000,000 | -$5,500,000 |
Jefferson of course makes things very complicated because he is a complete outlier contract as the only player legitimately earning over $30 million a season. Outlier contracts are not common in today’s NFL, but in the past they were typically non-starters in a contract discussion for another player if the outlier contract was recently signed. They might be used to push for an “inflation rate” of sorts but unless the other player was also considered a super special talent the contract was just brushed aside.
Three other contracts in the NFL have a stated value of $30 million a year or more. The actual values range between $27 and $29 million a season. Here is the breakdown of the recent players who I think would be used in a discussion for a contract extension for another player this summer.
| Player | Real APY | 2Y Games | 2Y Yards | YPG |
| Jefferson | $35,000,000 | 27 | 2,883 | 106.8 |
| Brown | $28,600,000 | 34 | 2,952 | 86.8 |
| Waddle | $28,250,000 | 31 | 2,370 | 76.5 |
| St. Brown | $28,000,000 | 32 | 2,676 | 83.6 |
| Moore | $27,500,000 | 34 | 2,252 | 66.2 |
| Smith | $25,000,000 | 33 | 2,262 | 68.5 |
| Collins | $24,250,000 | 25 | 1,778 | 71.1 |
The real values on these contracts do follow a pretty linear pattern with the main exception being Waddle who was likely slightly overpaid based on production. Collins was a unique case since there is more risk especially since his contract is almost all based on this season. That is a higher risk/reward contract signing.
When we look at Brandon Aiyuk he fits in the middle of the numbers. He has averaged 71.4 yards per game the last two years which is less than Brown, St. Brown and Waddle. Waddle is probably the high end comp for him and my guess would be that the 49ers see that as a poor contract for Miami. That said the salary difference is not too small and I think anything between $27.5M and $28.5M a year would be a fair offer. Below that is necessarily insulting but probably not giving him enough credit. Moving above that level would either be a bad contract for the team signing him or would require doing the same fake money years others have to bloat the annual value.
CeeDee Lamb is far more interesting. He is at 91.4 YPG the last two years and is coming off a Jefferson like year. He does not have Jefferson’s track record and Dallas should not consider using an outlier contract unless Lamb did it again this year, but his numbers are such that in this market he should earn a legit $30-$31 million per season. Teams are often very hesitant to be the first to break through a ceiling (in this case $30 million a year) but Jefferson at $34 million should make that easier to do.
Offering him in the range of the other player’s real values would probably be looked at as somewhat insulting to Lamb but Dallas’ wide receiver history (Dez Bryant, Amari Cooper, Michael Gallup) likely makes Dallas nervous. They have quickly fallen out of love with their players even when still somewhat productive and have basically gotten a low ROI out of the position. That makes the negotiations here real interesting because it is so many different factors at play between both sides.