The running back position has fallen on tough financial times in the NFL, at least when compared to other positions on the gridiron.
On Monday morning, the day of the deadline for teams and players to either agree on a new contract or take it or leave it with the franchise tag, several running backs remained unsigned, including Josh Jacobs, the league’s leading rusher last season, Dalvin Cook, a 1,100-yard rusher last season, and Saquon Barkley, another 1,000-yard rusher fighting for more money with the Giants, the only team he has known as an NFL player.
BMitch doesn’t like how running backs are being treated, at all, and he sounded off on the subject during Monday’s show, and says the devaluing of running backs in the NFL is the product of a collective decision by the league.
“How many quarterbacks have gotten deals and not lived up to it and screwed it up? Hell, Daniel Jones just got $40 million a year, and he isn’t a $40 million quarterback,” BMitch said. “The league has found a way, every year, to find positions they want to devalue. Not because they’re not good anymore, but because they want to devalue them.
“We started off the show saying that when Barkley was on the field, the Giants were a better football team…but they just want to devalue certain positons. Linebacker is another. Inside linebacker is another position where they don’t get paid like they used to, because they’ve devalued those positions.”
When the league collectively decides a position isn’t worth a big payday, the market dries up, and BMitch says that is what has happened for the running back, which is an unfair fate for the position that takes the biggest beating on the field.
“You talk about the sports where people get hurt the most. It’s football, and they are the ones that get the least amount of money guaranteed,” BMitch said. “A running back does more offensively than anyone on the field, even the damn quarterback. He has to run between the tackles tacking on big people. He has to block big people when they beat your offensive lineman. He has to take on people that are bigger than him on average when it’s a linebacker. He runs routes. Some running backs do everything. That guy is devalued, when I have a statue at quarterback who can’t live up to his hype, but they want to give him $40 million.
“You can’t just look at one position and say ‘Oh, that position doesn’t get paid.’”
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