Lamar Jackson hasn’t had much in the way of a public pre-draft process. While he’s the name on the tip of everyone’s tongue as the process plays out, Jackson’s been training in relative anonymity at home in South Florida. About the only thing we do know is that Jackson doesn’t have an agent.
Lamar Jackson is his own agent for now because he doesn’t really need one to negotiate his first NFL deal
He doesn’t need someone taking a cut of a contract that doesn’t really have to be haggled over.
Photo by Joe Robbins/Getty Images
Reports emerged over the last week that his mother was his agent, but at the NFL Combine Jackson cleared all that up saying that he will be representing himself in the boardroom with NFL teams, and that his mom is his “manager.”
In response to the absolute boom of rookie contracts throughout the 2000s for the highest picked players, the NFL and its Players Association agreed to a rookie wage scale for drafted players.
Essentially, that means that every draft pick earns a basically fixed amount. There’s a defined pool from which NFL teams can spend on rookies now, and it increases slightly each year along with the NFL salary cap. Top rookies get a four-year deal with a fifth-year team option. 2016’s No. 1 pick Jared Goff’s deal was $27.9 million with $18.6 million guaranteed, while 2017’s No. 1 pick, Myles Garrett, signed a $30.4 million with a $20.25 million guaranteed. From there, the numbers deescalate throughout the round in both total and guaranteed money.
Hiring an agent means you have to pay that agent a percentage of your wages because he or she negotiated the deal on your behalf, but when it comes to your first NFL contract, there’s little in the way of actual negotiation.
What an agent could do for Jackson is navigate the backroom interactions with NFL teams throughout the draft process and deal with shoe companies and potential endorsement deals. It’s doubtful Jackson’s mother has the experience to do that by herself, but no big deal, she’s got a team around her to handle those responsibilities as well.
Lamar Jackson isn’t flying into this whole thing blind or unmanaged, he’s going about his business quietly, and that’s fine.
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