contract/article_e93aafe7-eed9-526f-b2ac-d65d15f49e03.html
Rams, McQuaide each get security with contract
At the moment, the Rams have only three players whose contracts extend beyond the 2016 season — all three of which expire following the 2017 campaign.
There’s linebacker James Laurinaitis, who signed a contract extension on the eve of the 2012 season opener in Detroit. The second is tight end Jared Cook, who was signed to a free-agent deal in March.
The third may surprise: It’s Jake McQuaide, the third-year long snapper from Ohio State.
McQuaide quietly signed a four-year contract extension earlier this month. According to documents filed with the NFL Players Association, McQuaide will earn just under $3.5 million over the course of the extension (from 2014 through ’17), a total than includes a $500,000 signing bonus.
He was already under contract for the 2013 season under the original deal he signed as an undrafted rookie in 2011. He plays for the same base salary this season ($555,000) as he did under that original contract.
As McQuaide freely admits, signing a long snapper to an extension before he enters the final year of a contract “kind of is unprecedented.”
But there were good reasons to do so for both parties.
For McQuaide, it provides a measure of security because of the signing bonus, and the fact that his base salaries are at or just slightly above the league minimum in each year of the extension. As long as he’s still performing, McQuaide is less likely to price himself out of the business at the end of his contract.
That’s basically what happened to his predecessor, Chris Massey, in 2011. Massey counted $1.375 million against the salary cap and was due to make a base salary of $875,000 that season. Instead, the Rams saved cap money by releasing Massey and signing McQuaide to a base salary of $375,000 in 2011.
McQuaide said his agent, Glenn Schwartzman of Alliance Sports Management, broached the topic of an extension with the Rams around the time of the NFL scouting combine in February.
“He was just running ideas through his head and said if the Rams like you, and they don’t want to expose you to any kind of free agency, and don’t want to have to tender you, then it would be in their best interest and our best interest (to negotiate an extension),” McQuaide said. “What I told him was anything that you can do that keeps me in St. Louis is what I want to do.”
Negotiations didn’t heat up until after the spring practice period concluded in mid-June, and after the Rams’ 2013 draft class had agreed to terms and signed its contracts. McQuaide knew enough from talking to other players throughout the NFL that there were worse places to be than playing for coach Jeff Fisher and special teams coordinator John Fassel in St. Louis.
“I know I have it pretty good in St. Louis with Coach Fisher and Coach Fassel,” McQuaide said. “I couldn’t ask for a better punter (Johnny Hekker) and kicker (Greg Zuerlein) — the young nucleus that we have. I just think it’s an exciting place to be, an exciting team to be a part of, and we’re going in the right direction. I want to be a part of it.”
From a Rams perspective, the team avoids the possibility of having to tender McQuaide as a restricted free agent following the 2013 season. The minimum tender for a restricted free agent is expected to be around $1.4 million next offseason. With the extension, McQuaide’s cap count in 2014 will be a little more than half that amount, so the new deal creates more cap space for next offseason.
“No matter what, I’m making better money doing this than anything else I could be doing,” McQuaide said. “I get to do what I love, and not many people get a chance to do that.
“You have to perform in this league. One thing that you learn very quickly is that if you’re not performing, someone else will. So it is really nice that they’ve put their confidence in me. But it’s now my turn to perform.”
