Report: Packers & Davante Adams Headed Towards Franchise Tag?

The Green Bay Packers and Davante Adams reportedly broke off contract negotiations during the summer. Adams is, of course, in the final year of his current deal.

Adams wants to be paid like he’s the top receiver in football–something that he has absolutely earned, posting over 1,300 receiving yards in three of his last four seasons and at times looking unguardable with his release off the line of scrimmage.

I went into greater detail on this topic recently, but my best guess as to why the Packers and Adams haven’t come to an agreement is that each party has a different definition of what the highest-paid receiver in football is.

Adams is likely looking at the two-year extension that DeAndre Hopkins received, which pays him on average $27.25 million per year. Meanwhile, Green Bay is likely looking at Julio Jones’ recent deal, which has him at $22 million per year.

In a recent report from Ian Rapoport of the NFL Network, with Adams and the Packers still at a stalemate in negotiations — and who knows if they’ve even resumed — Rapoport has sources who believe that Green Bay will eventually end up using the franchise tag on Adams, which is expected to be around $20 million next season.

"“Green Bay has a tight cap situation in 2022 and, as it stands now, it would need to shed tens of millions of dollars just to get under the cap. However, based on Adams’ importance to the team, the cap situation should not prevent the Packers from keeping him, sources say.”"

As is widely known, the Green Bay Packers are going to have to make a number of difficult financial decisions this upcoming offseason.

Currently, Over the Cap has Green Bay at a projected $40.42 million over the 2022 salary cap. However, this figure does not include any free agent signings — such as Davante Adams — the incoming draft class, putting together a practice squad, or having cap space available for any in-season additions such as Whitney Mercilus or Rasul Douglas. So, in short, the Packers need to clear a lot more cap space than just that $40.42 million.

One of the benefits of signing Adams to a long-term deal, other than keeping him in Green Bay for the foreseeable future, is that it would allow the Packers to spread his cap hit out over the life of the contract. But with a franchise tag, since it is only a one-year deal and there aren’t any additional years to push cap charges towards, the Packers have the recognize the full $20 million cap hit in 2022.

Obviously, I’m not a salary cap expert, or anything close to that, but given Green Bay’s current financial situation, I have no clue how they would be able to make that work–that one move would add $20 million to Green Bay’s 2022 salary cap balance sheet. It is going to take some serious financial gymnastics from Brian Gutekunst and Russ Ball—which means a lot of roster turnover, reworking of current deals, and even then, seems like a very tall task.

Maybe the plan will be to continue working on an extension at that point, lowering Adams’ 2022 cap hit and keeping him in Green Bay beyond next season. Or perhaps as Packers Wire Zach Kruse pointed out, this is a leverage move by the Packers.

We already knew that this offseason was going to be a wild one, and if the Green Bay Packers do in fact franchise tag Davante Adams, that adds a whole new wrinkle to all of this.