The Green Bay Packers had some money to throw around after releasing Josh Sitton and they quickly used it. They used it to extend the contract of one of Sitton’s former linemates, left tackle David Bakhtiari.
Bakhtiari got a four-year deal worth up to $51.67 million. When the final year of Bakhtiari’s current deal is factored in, the contract will average out to $12 million per season. That’s the going rate for a top-tier left tackle.
In fact, it puts Bakhtiari among the five highest-paid offensive linemen in the league. His average salary is less than just Washington’s Trent Williams, New Orleans’ Terron Armstead, Dallas’ Tyron Smith and Buffalo’s Cordy Glenn.
All five guys are under 30 and all play tackle. Of the five, only Williams (4) and Smith (3) have actually earned a Pro Bowl berth.
In terms of performance, it’s questionable whether Bakhtiari is worth this much money. He’s definitely had his ups and downs, although he appears to be playing his best ball in 2016.
In terms of the market, Bakhtiari is certainly worth $12 million per season. Had he actually hit free agency, he might have made more.
Left tackles, even ones who are decent and not great, are hard to come by.
We don’t have the full breakdown of the deal, but we would expect the Packers used up a decent chunk of this year’s salary cap space to sign Bakhtiari. They had $16.9 million of cap space available after releasing Sitton. By front-loading a gigantic contract like this, they can lesson the cap hits in future seasons.
The Packers still have two potential free agents along their offensive line. Both center J.C. Tretter and guard T.J. Lang have contracts that expire after the season.
Really, I could be wrong but my guess this contract extension will be cap friendly this year and maybe next year. This is similiar to how the team extended Sitton and Lang contracts. I would be shocked if the Bahk extension takes up “a decent chunk of this years salary cap space”.
I’m not sure this deal will be cap friendly any year.
Wow….makes you wonder what the future of 2nd round pick Jason Spriggs will lead to.
I like Bak but I was pretty sure he was gonna walk…. I’m happy I suppose. Just no more of that preventing the free play crap when a defender jumps offsides & cut down on the penalties.
Great draft pick by TT by the way… ;)
I thought his agent would want 10 mill/year, and i figured that was too much. Here we go……51 million huh? Why not 60 million Ted? ? mean his an All Pro, and Pro Bowler
Interesting. Thank God Raji turned down Ted’s offer of 8mil/year and saved Ted from himself. Neither Cobb nor Shields are playing up to their contracts….Lets add another overpaid.
Ted is losing his mind and this team is going to shit….doubt me if you want, stay tuned.
LoL. You like to comment on every thread eh? Always doom & gloom huh?
Brother. Enjoy football & have fun
R-E-L-A-X
You’re right, overpay everyone, lets party bitches….whatever. Be back later, i’m out of kool aid.
Someone explain to this dumb ass how much a left tackle would go for on the open market? You might want to include sock puppets.
And by the way, I drank all your Kool-Aid bitch!
To doubt you would you mean have a small chance of being right. You’ve got a slim to none chance of that and slim said “fuck pf4l” and bailed.
” he appears to be playing his best ball in 2016.”
After 1 game against Jacksonville?……..It’s like i come to this site and someone taser’s me in the balls with this kind of shit (logic) everyday…ouch…lol
Uh… did that tiny brain of yours forget all about training camp and the preseason?
Hello, Mcfly! Anybody in there?
But please, continue with the Packer hatin. I’m sure Monty and the rest of the Total TMZ Packer crowd would be proud.
Bak is a gym rat. 2nd coming of Chad Clifton & another Teddy T 4th round gem.
Bak is lithe & agile. His weakness is penalties but he never gets Rodgers killed. A 4-year deal is a good number. Keep him going hard to another contract when he’s into his 8th season.
The alternatives? Bulaga shifting to LT or an unproven Spriggs in his 2nd season next year
Give me Bak & give him to me all day every day.
You’re last sentence seems somewhat….ummm……
Somehow TT again manage to do the opposite of what the writers of this site expects ore would like
( http://sgtest.totalpackers.com/2015/12/when-it-comes-to-penalties-david-bakhtiari-rules/ ) .
Did that got him to a SB, let alone win one lately?
Never mind lets give a big contract to can’t run block, can’t pass block,bull rushed penalty machine.
Great link, Zwoeger. Here we have an article celebrating that the Packers did not take the site’s heartfelt advice. I guess, to be fair, it is noteworthy it is two different writers. Bonham may truly be happy about the signing and Monty may truly hate it.
As a Vikings fan I remember good games where David B. allowed sacks and made penalties and bad games where he shutout our DE while making space for Lacey to trample my guys. See how my perspective is different from your own?
Tackles are more valuable than guards, but:
1. At their respective positions Sitton excelled and David B. has been above average.
2. Their respective contracts Sitton’s “value” — dollars paid for performance garnered — was fantastic and David B. is a below average or even a poor “value”. Put another way, Sitton’s performance could have regressed quite a bit and still been a good deal while David B.’s deal absolutely relies on leaps of performance to justify it. (Which IS possible.)
Look at it this way: Envision Spriggs playing LT next four years at approx. 1 mil. per year. Fewer penalties? Very likely. Better pass pro? Maybe or not. Better run blocking? Maybe or not. But David B. will get 11 million MORE than him per season. Do you picture an 11 mil. differential in performance? I sure don’t. Maybe no differential essentially. So, would you rather have David B. for 2017 to 2020 or Spriggs and an absolute premier free agent? I’m talking a Dontari Poe or a Chandler Jones here.
I know, as a Vikings fan, I am pleased with this signing and relieved.
I predict David B. makes one false start Sunday night, one other penalty, and allows a sack to Everson Griffen.
P.S. Knowing the Packers likely not much of this year’s cap space was used for this contract and, yes, they easily could have resigned him without having cut Sitton. This contract does not justify the Sitton cut. In fact, the last minute mean-hearted vengeful fashion of that cut means NOTHING can justify it.
In other news, though the Bears signed SItton to a big guaranteed contract, and apparently he played pretty well for them over the weekend, Cutler still got sacked 5 times against the Texans.
A bit overpaid but perhaps less so as time goes on and the shared revenue pool increases and cap spaces go up. So, all in all, it was an OK deal considering all of that and the fact that Left Tackle is considered a premium position to spend money on. Still, they have elected to overpay some others to keep them home.