The Fallout From Franchising Brent Grimes

By now I’m sure most of you have heard the news that Brent Grimes has been handed the franchise tag from the Falcons front office. As we have been speculating here on Blogging Dirty this move made a ton of sense. Grimes was too valuable an asset to let simply walk for nothing.

The move shows that the Falcons staff still are big fans of Brent Grimes, which was a doubt since the end of the season. The coaches obviously have a plan for how he will fit into this more man coverage focused D. I personally love Grimes playing in man and usually does a stand-up job. He should perform exceptionally well in Nolan’s D especially with some added pass rush coming from the advanced scheme.

Now Grimes is under the franchise tag, talks will continue on a long term deal as both sides seem to get one done. Grimes clearly isn’t delighted about the prospect of playing under yet another one year deal and will push hard for the new deal. Soon after news came the franchise tag had been given to Brent, his agent came out and said he will not sign the franchise tag. This is an obvious bargaining ploy from the Grimes camp to try and force a new deal. While it may not be an ideal situation, expect nothing to develop in these talks till the deadline to sign the franchise tender some time in July.

For now let’s assume Grimes signs his tender and plays on the one year, $10.6 million deal. The deal hamstrings the Falcons a bit going forward. After including Grimes’ contract the Falcons have roughly $20 million in cap space and that could be down to roughly $16 million with the expected signing of DE/OLB Kroy Biermann.

Fans hoping for the signing of Mario Williams, will be disappointed as the Falcons do not have the cap space now to pull that off. G Carl Nicks still is a possibility but the Falcons will struggle to secure his services is other teams come in heavily for him.

Corner now will not be a need in the draft. The Falcons will make an effort to resign CB Kelvin Hayden and with the Falcons young depth at corner look pretty set at that spot heading further into the off-season.