Baltimore Ravens owner Steve Bisciotti and general manager Ozzie Newsome each spoke briefly on Tuesday about the team's free agency situation. One topic in particular that they waded into was the free agency of wide receiver Torrey Smith.
Newsome said, "We have a history of retaining our players, especially players that have been productive. But also, we have a history of allowing our players to go out and maximize themselves in the market and go and play for other teams." So basically, he wants to bring Smith back, but only at a number that makes sense for the Ravens, which may not be congruent with Smith's wishes. Fine, makes perfect sense. That's how most teams tend to conduct their business.
Bisciotti, meanwhile, made a direct comparison to a past free agent when discussing why it may not be prudent to pay Smith as much as he might be looking for.
Do you hope that Torrey doesn't break the bank out in the open market so we can get him for our number? That's a hard thing to say. I care about the kid, I want to maximize his earnings," he said. "... some of the numbers thrown out there we can't match. We don't have that kind of space...
The difference between what we can pay Torrey and what he gets on the open market, umm, Mike Wallace got $10 million. I don't think anyone thinks that was a good deal. And so there is always a team that has lots of money that wants to bring in playmakers and those guys are going to get those deals.
It's a little unusual to hear an owner call out a player who isn't on his own team for an exhorbitant salary, but let's move beyond that and focus instead on the player comparison. How similar is Smith right now to Wallace when he hit free agency two years ago? Does the parralel make sense?
What you see here are two very similar players through the first four years of their respective careers. However, it seems fairly clear that Wallace was the superior player when he hit the open market. He had a higher catch rate (Rec %), yards per reception (Yds/Rec) and per route run (YRR), as well as a better passer rating on throws in his direction (WR Rating). He also had more catches and touchdowns on fewer targets, and the same number of deep catches (throws 20-plus yards down the field) on 31 fewer targets. Simply put, he was better than Smith across the board.
Wallace hasn't exactly been a smashing success since landing in Miami. Obviously, some of the drop-off in his production should be attributed to the drop-off from Ben Roethlisberger to Ryan Tannehill, a quarterback who rarely throws deep.
Still, such a similar -- but superior -- player get a big money deal and then not live up to it is understandably on the mind of the Ravens' owner. The quote he gave may not amount to much more than a negotiating stance, but it's encouraging to see that Baltimore knows exactly the kind of player they're dealing with here and that they aren't overvaluing him just because he was drafted and developed in their system.
