Sometimes Twitter can bring a smile to your face; especially as an astute observer. Of course, the Denial of Service that hit Twitter on Thursday caused so many people so much social networking pain aside, I've been watching what people are Tweeting Alvin Keels (Andre Smith's agent). Here's some notable Tweets.
- "Please bring Andre to Georgetown by Monday, Alvin. Please. Collins is no slouch and Andre's losing out, man!"
- "Don't you have some Bengals work to do?"
- One Man Crimewave Tweeted to Keels: "What are you doing running while Andre sits?" after Keels Tweeted, "I just got in from a good 3 mile run..did it in 26 minutes. I have to get better. About to hit this band workout! then back to work!"
- "The Bengals Fans are really wondering when Andre will get into camp. He's slotted...what's the holdup?"
- "how about getting our guy Andre signed. He needs to be in camp with all these TE's going down"
- "Andre Smith???/ Who Dey Nation awaits news!"
- Keels Tweeted "I have a bad headache right now! I don't even want to get off of my couch to go to my bed! Migraines are the worst!", which drew this response, "I'd have a bad headache too with as long it's taking you to get your 1st rounder signed. Get it done and be done."
As for Smith, and the progress of negotiations, there isn't any. However, camps started hitting the media trail yesterday, making public their most recent negotiations. And while the Brown family is the Brown family and you can't teach old dogs new tricks, this did surprise me.
According to parties familiar with the negotiations, the Bengals have offered of $33 million. That's $5.25 million less than what the seventh pick, Darrius Heyward-Bey, signed for with Oakland.
Reedy continues:
Smith's camp is looking for something slightly higher than Heyward-Bey's deal. The sides had not talked since Monday as of this morning.
Honestly. We all figured that the unspoken mandate of paying a rookie based on where they picked was a given. The hold up is that you offered $5.25 million less than Darius Heyward-Bey? Seriously?
The Bengals are remaining firm in trying to sign Smith for less. As of Friday morning, eight first-round picks remain unsigned, including picks 8-11. The Bengals are possibly waiting for those picks to sign and see if they follow the same strategy of signing for less or the same amount as last year.
It's one thing to be firm when you feel a player is trying to extort too much money out of you, based on a principle that the player selected ahead of you was a quarterback; thus valued more. I could have understood waiting for Aaron Curry's deal to create an adjusted ceiling. Hell. I might have even supported that. After the way the system is structured, the way teams conduct negotiations for top-value draft picks, it's very surprising that the Bengals would try to offer Smith something less than what the seventh round pick received. How in the hell did they expect Keels or Smith would accept that?
Maybe I shouldn't be surprised. But I am.