He is legend.

Will Smith woke up this morning with 70 million brand spankin’ new reasons to get jiggy wit it. (Great, now DJ Jazzy Jeff is gonna start screaming for an extension too.)

And apparently, he’s about to tie the knot with this smokin’ little number.

It’s good to be the king. Right about now, it’s even better to be the prince.

As for Mickey Loomis, I guess that’s one down, two to go. You’ve gotta figure Big Number Twelve will be getting his soon enough. The going rate at the moment seems to be somewhere around $9MM (Randy Moss: 3 yrs/$27MM, Terrell Owens: 4 yrs/$34MM, Calvin Johnson: 6 yrs/$55MM) And then there’s Jahri Evans, who probably won’t snag quite as much cheese as Derrick Dockery’s 7 yrs/$49MM, but these days, you never know. You have to figure #73 is gonna have to wait in line behind #12, but if anybody can get them both done before they line up this fall, Mickey Loomis can.

There’s been plenty of discussion about whether or not Smith "deserves" to be the third highest-paid defensive end in the league. I think the word "deserves" is about 99% irrelevant when it comes to NFL contracts. It’s not about whether he "deserves" it, the only thing that matters is whether or not there were any better options available for the team. Apparently, in Loomis’ opinion, there weren’t. And I agree.

You can’t just arrive at some kind of "objective" monetary value and draw a line in the sand at that amount. It just doesn’t work that way. In a blue collar utopia where grade school teachers, cops and firemen get paid more than professional athletes, maybe you pay a guy what he’s "worth" and not a penny more. But in the real world, you’ve gotta worry about whether or not your team can handle the distraction if the player is unhappy. You have to worry about what kind of feelings about your organization it might breed if you "disrespect" your best defensive player. You have to worry about how you’re going to replace him if he holds out and/or dogs it while playing out his current contract. And if you’re a contender, you have to worry about whether or not you can win a championship with whatever replacements are at your disposal.

What were the Saints supposed to do, play Bobby McCray every down? I know everybody’s excited about the guy, and that’s great. I’m excited too. But he had 18 tackles and 3 sacks last year. Many Saints fans are pissed off at Smith after he put up "only" 66 tackles and 7 sacks last year. You’re gonna draw a line in the sand based on "principle" and try to win a championship with McCray in on every down?

Maybe you do that if you aren’t really going for it this year. Maybe you do that if it’s going to cost you some other, more important player. Neither apply to the 2008 Saints.

"But 6 years?!? That’s too much of a commitment for a guy who hasn’t lived up to his draft status!" But you’re kind of screwed out of the option of a shorter deal if Smith won’t sign it, don’t you think? It’s called negotiation.

Sometimes you have to bite the bullet and "overpay" (which is one of the most meaningless, yet overused, words in the 21st century sports fan lexicon) for the sake of…. wait for it…. winning a damned championship for once. Signing Smith doesn’t come with any guarantees of success, of course, but it sure as hell doesn’t hurt. Call it "overpaying" if you must, and you think you have the slightest clue what you’re talking about, but sometimes "overpaying" is the best option you’ve got.

Meantime, for all the shit Smith has taken from fans for his "disappointing" performance last year. his 66 tackles were good for 8th in the league among defensive linemen, 5th among defensive ends. It was also a career high. He also forced 2 fumbles and recovered 3.

Sure, his sacks were down to "only" 7, from 10.5 in 2006. But while most people are quick to give lip service to "sacks aren’t the end all be all of a defensive end’s value" I really think most people don’t mean it, and tend to judge DEs based almost solely on sack stats.

I’m convinced that a big part of Smith’s perceived decline last year is because Gary Gibbs felt like he had to reel Smith in for the sake of run defense. Smith’s tackles increased at the expense of sacks, and to at least some degree, that was a deliberate decision on the part of Payton and Gibbs.

In 2006, everybody loved Shanle and he had a ton of tackles. But the Saints’ run defense sucked. In 2007, Smith was making a big chunk of those tackles at the line of scrimmage, rather than Shanle 5 to 8 yards downfield. Shanle’s tackle numbers went down, Smith’s tackles went up. Now everybody hates Shanle, and they’re pissed at Smith. But the Saints’ overall run defense numbers improved. The downside is that it came at the expense of shackling Smith. They robbed Peter to pay Paul. It didn’t work out like I’m sure the staff had hoped, but the decision to try it and see was understandable.

Another issue was that it’s hard to make a sack off the edge when the QB has about six yards worth of pocket to step up into. You have to figure that will be less of an issue this year with Big Sed, and with any luck, maybe TheMario will help out on that issue as well.

And the final point on Smith is a point I’ve made plenty before, and I’m sure I’ll make it plenty more in the future. A good front office doesn’t pay a player for what he’s done. It pays a player for what he’s going to do. Paying players for what they’ve done is how you end up with a roster full of washed up vets killing your payroll and not performing.

Sure, paying a guy for what he’s going to do requires projection, and that, by definition, carries risk. Sometimes you whiff. But there’s plenty of legitimate basis to be optimistic about Smith’s performance over the next several years, especially with a bonafide stud DT on board and the promise of a stud weakside linebacker of some kind playing behind him next year. That’s the kind of guy you pay and build around.

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In other news, the Hall Of Fame Class of 2013 now includes Brett Favre, Warren Sapp, Michael Strahan and Jonathan Ogden. Nice.

Word is that Favruh is really, really, really, REALLY thinking about playing another season now. You know that both Strahan and Sapp are gonna absolutely kill with their speeches. Those two are nothing if not entertaining. No way in hell ole Brett is gonna stand for that on BRETT’S BIG DAY.

Brett thought about asking the committee to hold off a year and induct him in 2014 instead, assuming all the other 2014 inductees are boring as shit. You know, guards and punters and old dudes from the 50s. But then that would mean Brett wasn’t a first-ballot HOFer. Can’t have that.

So mark it down. Ole Brett will be strapping ‘em back up this fall for one more go.

But only if some GM asks really, really nice. And often. For about the next three months, while he thinks about it. Wouldn’t hurt to kneel while you’re asking too, mister GM. And have your fans write a bunch of letters and shit. Brett loves that.