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Our long, national nightmare is over: Le’Veon Bell is not going to play in 2018 after failing to show up and sign his franchise tender by 4 p.m. ET on Tuesday afternoon. Bell’s absence opened up the stage for James Conner, ruined millions of fantasy teams and cost the running back $14 million guaranteed (at least).
So where will he play in 2018? Odds were released by BetOnline.ag and Bell is favored to land with the Jets (the top fave at 3-1) or the Raiders or the Buccaneers. All those teams make sense because of their cap space, although the Raiders paying Bell after not paying Khalil Mack would be too rich for words.
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But what if Bell doesn’t have to go somewhere else? Or what if he CAN’T go somewhere else? He will ostensibly be a free agent come next March when, according to CBS Sports NFL Insider Jason La Canfora (who joined me on the Pick Six Podcast, our daily NFL pod, subscribe: via iTunes | via Stitcher | via TuneIn | via Google Play), the Steelers use the transition tag on him.
Bell will be able to shop himself to other teams and sign an offer sheet, but the Steelers will retain the ability to match. And JLC wouldn’t rule out that happening.
“Or they match it and at some point they could always trade him too,” La Canfora said. “He saved them $15 million this year. That’s $15 million they had budgeted too spend on player costs. They spent none of it. They may end up getting multiple home games [in the playoffs] which is a bonanza and going to a Super Bowl and they’ve still got that in their back pocket.”
Would the Steelers really want to match whatever contract the Jets — or whoever — offered Bell? Well, the logic is this: if Bell doesn’t get a massive contract offer in free agency, or gets one that looks like what the Steelers offered him previously, they could ultimately decide it’s worth keeping Bell on the roster because of the depth and talent he would provide them at running back.
“I can tell you this — look, a week ago I was like, Conner should be in the discussion for the MVP, but he also runs in a style that may not be that durable — they could squat on Bell. Like, they can’t give Conner a contract if they wanted to. They might look at things like the Saints are looking at things right now [with their quarterback situation], let’s say they do have a great run this year, even if they do win it,” La Canfora noted. “Maybe they throw a little something something at Ben [Roethlisberger]. They could still be in a position to say, Le’Veon Bell gives us our best shot to win it next year, especially if Conner goes down. They could use Le’Veon split out as a wideout. If he’d have come back this year, you weren’t going to necessarily see him competing with Conner. You were going to see him taking time away from [James] Washington and [Ryan] Switzer and those guys.
“He was first going to be folded into the passing game and once they think he’s got his legs under him, he’ll get more carries and he’ll share the load more with Conner, but they’ve got plenty of ways they can use him.”
It’s also possible the Steelers could just let Bell walk and try and secure a future compensatory pick (it would be a late third-round pick if everything breaks right). La Canfora doesn’t see it happening.
“I really don’t [think they’ll let him walk]. They’ve been investigating the transition tag for a long time,” La Canfora said. “I know they’ve had many conversations with the NFL management council about how they thought that would play out. I think to them, it’d be worth it for them to make the decision. The compensatory pick, who knows what they’re going to do in free agency. Maybe it’s a three, but there’s no guarantee. And if his market’s soft, maybe it’s a four.
“I think it’s worth it to them to have this player they drafted and developed, they get to make the final say. They get to make the final say of whether he’s a Pittsburgh Steeler or not. And they’re in win-now mode. We’re talking about a 2020 draft pick.”
That would be something else. We presumed the drama with Bell and the Steelers was over and done with, but it actually sounds more and more like it might just be on pause until March.
So what happens next? Bell sits out the rest of the season and won’t be a factor in anything until the new league year. He won’t be paid and the Steelers won’t have to worry about him.
Come Feb. 19, the window will open for teams to franchise tag and transition tag players. The Steelers will likely hit Bell with the transition tag, at which point there will probably be a multi-week/month battle between the team and the player on the cost of said tag. The timing of THAT will be interesting, because the tag deadline runs up pretty close to free agency. Specifically, March 4 is the deadline to tag players, while March 13 is the opening of free agency (March 11 is the legal tampering window, but I don’t believe you can negotiate with a player on a transition tag then).
Bell will not want to wait a long time after the start of free agency to shop himself around; he and his agent will very much want to be a part of the first wave of free agency. You’ll recall Kyle Fuller secured an offer sheet from the Packers before the Bears matched him this past offseason — all of that went down on March 16, not long after the start of the new league year.
In other words, all of this is over … for now. But there’s no guarantee whatsoever that Bell walks freely into the open market and this whole saga could actually end up with Bell trying to figure out what to do in 2019 when he’s a member of the Steelers.
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