Amari Rodgers Remains Unsigned; Here’s Why

Including Green Bay Packers receiver Amari Rodgers, there are more unsigned third-round picks than the other six rounds combined.

GREEN BAY, Wis. – Of the Green Bay Packers’ nine selections in the 2021 NFL Draft, only one player remains unsigned: third-round receiver Amari Rodgers.

That Rodgers hasn’t signed is not unusual. The third round is always a sticky spot because it’s the one round where there is actual negotiating to be done between team and agent.

That’s even more true than usual this year. As of midday Thursday, there were nine unsigned picks in the first round, eight in the second round, one in the fourth round and zero in the fifth, sixth and seventh rounds. That’s 18 rookies without a contract in those six rounds. Of the 41 players selected in this year’s third round, 27 are unsigned.

Here’s why, according to an agent who negotiated one of this year’s third-round contracts.

In the first round, most players get fully guaranteed contracts.

In the second round, everybody gets the first two years fully guaranteed and the top players get a portion of Year 3 guaranteed.

In the fourth round and beyond, there’s nothing to negotiate with the contracts essentially written into the decade-old collective bargaining agreement.

“The third round has always been a unique round. What we negotiate is what we call ‘additional compensation,’” the agent said.

In the third round, the CBA provides a maximum annual contract value for each player. For instance, in the case of Rodgers, those numbers are $660,000 (the league minimum, plus a $923,564 signing bonus) for Year 1, $882,723 in Year 2, $1,105,446 in Year 3 and $1,328,169 in Year 4. The league-minimum base salaries are the aforementioned $660,000 in Year 1, $825,000 in Year 2, $940,000 in Year 3 and $1.055 million in Year 4.

Added together, that “additional compensation” of $496,338 – the difference between the max value of $4,899,902 and the bonus-plus-minimum total of $4,403,564 – is where there’s negotiation between the Packers’ Russ Ball and Rodgers’ agent, Chafie Fields.

Rodgers was the 22nd pick of the third round. In 2017, the 22nd selection received 90.65 percent of the maximum compensation. That inched to 91.1 percent in 2018 and 92.19 percent in 2019 before jumping to 98.08 percent in 2020.

Here’s where it gets interesting. The 26th pick of this year’s third round, Houston Texans receiver Nico Collins, received 100 percent.

“That’s the one that everybody in the league was buzzing on,” the agent said.

That unprecedented contract seemingly has put the brakes on signings. The first 12 selections of the third round have signed, as did the 18th pick (Washington Football Team receiver Dyami Brown) and Collins. That’s it.

The battle isn’t over chump change, especially for salary-cap challenged teams like Green Bay that need to stick to a budget. At last year’s 98.08 percent, Rodgers would receive $4,805,824. That’s $94,078 less than what it probably will cost the Packers due to the precedent-setting contracted signed by Collins. If the Packers had expected to pay 99 percent, the contract would cost $4,850,903 – $48,999 less than what it ultimately will cost.

“It’s always been a fight in the third round,” the agent said. “The media keeps saying, ‘It’s all slotted. It’s easy.’ It’s not. If you have a third-rounder, it’s not easy. At 26, [the Texans with Collins] just made it harder for everybody else on the team side.”