With just one day to go until the Jaguars report for training camp, the team decided to squeeze in one last contract extension, and it was a big one.
The Jaguars announced Tuesday that they've signed center Brandon Linder to a five-year extension. According to NFL.com, the new deal will make Linder the highest-paid center in NFL history.
The five-year extension is worth $51.7 million and includes $24 million in guaranteed money. With an average annual value of $10.34 million, Linder will be pulling in more than Cowboys center Travis Frederick, who was previously the league's highest paid center after signing a six-year deal worth $56.4 million last August.
Lindor's $24 million guarantee also supersedes the $20 million guarantee that Alex Mack received when he signed with the Falcons in March 2016.
Despite the monstrosity of the deal, the Jags won't be hurting for salary cap room as they head into the 2017 season.
#Jaguars still roughly $37 million under the salary cap after Linder extension.
— Hays Carlyon (@HaysCarlyon) July 25, 2017
For Tom Coughlin, the Jaguars executive vice president of football operations, the decision to give Lindor a record-breaking deal was a no-brainer.
"Brandon has proven on the field that he is capable of highly productive performances, and this is a high performance business," Coughlin said in a statement. "We look for his continued leadership development as an anchor of our offensive line. Brandon has earned this new contract and the high expectations that go with it."
With Jaguars veterans set to report to training camp on Wednesday, Linder said it was important to get the deal done as soon as possible.
"It was something we wanted to get done so now we can just ball," Linder told the Florida Times-Union. "We knew after OTAs we wanted to talk. In the past two weeks [we] got some traction."
Linder has been in Jacksonville since 2014 when he was selected in the third round of the NFL Draft. He started out his career in Jacksonville as a right guard before being switched to center prior to the 2016 season. Linder has started 32 games for the Jaguars over the past three seasons.
The new deal means Linder will be getting a big pay raise. Before signing the extension, Linder was getting set to play 2017 under the final season of a four-year, $2.8 million rookie deal that he signed in 2014.
