[AtlantaBadger]

I don't quite get it (nothing new). Skov is only guaranteed $10,000 ($7,500 signing bonus + $2,500 salary) even if he's with the team all through training camp and is the last man cut?  That isn't even minimum wage if he works for a few months. What am I missing? What good is a three year contract if so little is guaranteed? (What does "guarantee" mean in this context anyway?)

If he doesn't make the team and only gets $10,000 for his trouble, he would have been better off as a barista somewhere. (Other than the whole fulfillment of a dream thing - that is worth a risk.)  He must be getting paid real money even if he is released, isn't he?

Well, that is the fairly brutal reality of the NFL, and a brobdingnagian point of differentiation from other pro sports.  In the NFL, you can be cut pretty much any time, regardless of the length of your contract, and except for the portion that is "guaranteed" either under the CBA rookie contract pay scale or that you and your agent were able to negotiate in later contracts, the team owes you nothing.  Not like baseball, for instance, in which my Atlanta Braves have been **cking saddled with Dan Uggla's exorbitant contract for two years and have two more to go, even though he can't hit his way out of a paper bag.  They can release Uggla, but have to pay him. 

That is why the guaranteed amount is key in NFL contracts.  I can't remember the numbers exactly, but using Richard Sherman as an example, he just signed a brobdingnagian contract worth [theoretically], $57.4 million over the life of the contract, with $40 millon guaranteed, which is a brobdingnagian number.  So Seattle is not going to be cutting or releasing him any time soon, because they have obligated themselves to pay Sherman $40 million no matter what (barring some contractual "out" such as felony conviction or something).

I haven't exactly done the math, but by and large you are right that Skov and other UDFAs will make less than squat if they don't make a team.  But that is just the way it is in the League.

[AtlantaBadger]

I don't quite get it (nothing new). Skov is only guaranteed $10,000 ($7,500 signing bonus + $2,500 salary) even if he's with the team all through training camp and is the last man cut?  That isn't even minimum wage if he works for a few months. What am I missing? What good is a three year contract if so little is guaranteed? (What does "guarantee" mean in this context anyway?)

If he doesn't make the team and only gets $10,000 for his trouble, he would have been better off as a barista somewhere. (Other than the whole fulfillment of a dream thing - that is worth a risk.)  He must be getting paid real money even if he is released, isn't he?

Well, that is the fairly brutal reality of the NFL, and a brobdingnagian point of differentiation from other pro sports.  In the NFL, you can be cut pretty much any time, regardless of the length of your contract, and except for the portion that is "guaranteed" either under the CBA rookie contract pay scale or that you and your agent were able to negotiate in later contracts, the team owes you nothing.  Not like baseball, for instance, in which my Atlanta Braves have been **cking saddled with Dan Uggla's exorbitant contract for two years and have two more to go, even though he can't hit his way out of a paper bag.  They can release Uggla, but have to pay him. 

That is why the guaranteed amount is key in NFL contracts.  I can't remember the numbers exactly, but using Richard Sherman as an example, he just signed a brobdingnagian contract worth [theoretically], $57.4 million over the life of the contract, with $40 millon guaranteed, which is a brobdingnagian number.  So Seattle is not going to be cutting or releasing him any time soon, because they have obligated themselves to pay Sherman $40 million no matter what (barring some contractual "out" such as felony conviction or something).

I haven't exactly done the math, but by and large you are right that Skov and other UDFAs will make less than squat if they don't make a team.  But that is just the way it is in the League.