Holy crap, it's March already?

That's probably what Mickey Loomis mumbled to himself yesterday morning as he stumbled out of bed. Right, Florio?

Fortunately, Mickey was able to get himself caught up on Lost and free up a bunch of much-needed DVR space just in time to hop a plane to Indy and watch Terrence Cody straight up dominate the ranch dressing drill at the combine. (Unofficial results had him breaking the combine record set by Hugo Reyes in 2004.)

During commercial breaks, Mickey went ahead and extended qualifying offers to 15 of the Saints' 18 restricted free agents. Apparently, he also managed to piss off Darren Sharper and send a fairly large subset of Saints fans into a frenzy of confused outrage by declining to use the franchise tag and opting instead to allow Sharper to test free agency. Which evidently qualifies as a blatant display of disrespeck™. Or something.

One can only guess as to why anyone, including Sharper himself, is upset by this.

After all, only 11 days ago, Sharper was telling Nakia Hogan that he didn't want to be tagged, and that he would prefer a multi-year deal. Which isn't surprising, that's what they all say. (That, and "d'oh!")

But 5 days later, after the Saints had confirmed that they wouldn't be tagging him, Sharper started hinting to NFL.com's Steve Wyche that he didn't feel like the Saints were showing him the proper respeck™.

They said they want me back, but if you want someone back, why are you going to let them test the market? I don't know how much they want me back if they're allowing other teams to bid for my services. Being in this situation before, if a team is willing to let you test the market, they're willing to let you go.

I don't know, Darren. Maybe it's because of what you said to Wyche just a couple minutes later:

I'm going to want to be compensated market value

So he's not happy with an above-market-value salary for 2010 on a one-year franchise tender ($6.455MM) and wants a market-value multi-year deal instead, but at the same time, he feels unwanted because the Saints are allowing the market to establish the aforementioned market value.

Which isn't surprising either, given that his testing of the market last year resulted in a $1.7MM one-year deal from the Saints. Sharper never really wanted to test the market in the first place. What he wanted was for Mickey Loomis to back a dumptruck full of cash into his driveway. Evidence?

They know the value. It's simple economics. You pay someone what they deserve. I was a bargain deal last year.

Sorry, Darren. You weren't a "bargain" last year. You got a market-value deal last year. How do I know? Because you were on the market, and you signed the deal the Saints offered you because it was the best (or only) offer you had on the table. It's great that you had such a good year in 2009, but the Saints already paid you for 2009. The Saints don't owe you anything more than that.

One can infer that while Sharper claims to want a market-value deal, what he really wants is what he feels like he "deserves" and that number is probably a good bit higher than his actual market value. And it probably includes a sizable retroactive bonus for being such a "bargain" last year.

Meantime, I didn't hear this myself and I have no idea how true it is, but apparently Gus Kattengill told some radio show host the other day that the Saints have a 3 year, $11MM offer on the table for Sharper, which includes $6MM in guaranteed money. An offer that you have to assume is front-loaded with 2010 being uncapped. An offer that sits unsigned, presumably because Sharper doesn't think it's enough.

So let's break it down. $6MM guaranteed is pretty much the value that the tag would have carried. But rather than tagging him, the Saints added another 2 years and $5MM to the offer. Multi-year deal, just like Sharper said he preferred over the tag. Even if the Saints release him after next year, he still gets the guaranteed $6MM at a minimum, which is almost four times what he made last year. If he plays out the full 3 years, the $11MM total value of the contract averages out to $3.66MM per year, which is more than double his 2009 salary. And he doesn't have to test the market.

If true, on what planet does this equate to disrespeck™ on the part of the Saints' front office? If Sharper thinks that's "below market value" for a 34 year old safety coming off of one good (not great) year after only being able to get $1.7MM the previous offseason on the open market, the only sane response is the one Loomis is apparently giving: "Yeah, we'll see about that. Give me a call once you've had your fill of disrespeck™ on the open market. Again."

Look. I'm the last guy to begrudge somebody his desire to maximize his earning potential. I get it, and I don't have the slightest problem with it. Message Board Guy might want you to take whatever the Saints' front office offers you and smile about it (that's what he wants everybody to do) but I don't expect that from anybody.

I'm just saying, way to be a douche about it. Way to play the disrespeck™ card after you said you didn't want to be tagged and they didn't tag you, you said you wanted a multi-year deal and they offered it, you said you wanted a raise and they offered it, and you say you want market value but are whining about having to go on the market.

Is it "simple economics" or isn't it? Do you want "market value" or do you want some arbitrary number you feel you "deserve?" Do you really understand the business of football or are you Message Board Guy in cleats? Pick a fuckin' position already.

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As evidenced by the way this post started, I had intended to spend most of this space shoving my opinions of the RFA tenders and their implications down your throat. But I'm already at 1000 words, and all indications are that people start sighing and rolling their eyes when you go too far beyond that. And I have work to do. Probably. I assume so, anyway.

So, uh, yeah. Didn't realize that the Sharper situation would get me going like that. I'll get to the RFAs tommorrow, maybe Thursday. With it being the offseason and all, it's not like anybody's gonna be reading any of this anyway.

Until then… Terrence Cody vs. Hugo Reyes vs. Steven Morrissey in a no-holds-barred battle royale. Goal? Chug the most sausage gravy. ¿Quién es más macho?