E-GIANTS
Dave Klein was the Giants' beat writer
for The Star-Ledger from 1961 to 1995.
He is the author of 26 books and he is one of
only four sportswriters to have covered all the Super Bowls.
Dave has allowed TEAM GIANTS to reprint some of his articles.

By DAVE KLEIN
General manager Ernie Accorsi is paranoid, which isn't surprising because his mentor, the late George Young, refined paranoia to an art form.

So speaking to Accorsi usually turns into a battle of words, and you have to pick your spots very carefully.

For instance, he won't talk about players not under contract to the Giants. Nor will he comment on his interest, if any, in other players who may or may not be under contract to other teams.

On the other hand, he won't engage in opinions on the merits of signing some of those players, and he is loathe to even deal with the merits of players rumored to be of interest to the Giants.

Finally, if you ask him about the salary cap, he turns into a sphinx. "You know I'm not going to talk about those things," he says. "None of them. You see, this is a business, our business. Much of it is secret. We can't let other teams know what we're doing or trying to do or what we like or don't like. And I absolutely don't want agents to learn about our money, how much we have and how much we will spend."

So the conversation has more hair-pin turns than straight roads, and you have to read between all those lines to get a glimmer of what things really are.

One question concerned the so-called "street free agents," the ones released from their contracts and their current status. "If they don't have a contract," Accorsi said, "you could sign them any time."

And why, pray tell, hasn't that happened? "Teams are trying to find out if they have the money and if they do how they want to spend it," he responded. "Media members think they know everything about the salary cap, and they don't."

So to take just two of those "street free agents" as examples, he was asked about former Dolphin cornerback Sam Madison and former Redskin linebacker LaVar Arrington -- coincidentally, two that have been mentioned as wanting to sign with the Giants.

"I don't have a comment on that," Accorsi said, on the eve of the opening of the 2006 Free Agency period (Saturday at 12:01 a.m. ET).

But Madison's agent, the irrepressible Drew Rosenhaus, had a comment. Late Friday afternoon he announced that his client, a nine-year veteran and four-time Pro Bowl player, had agreed to a four-year contract with the Giants.

He even released the details -- which include a $2 million signing bonus, base salaries of $900,000 in Year One, $1.2 million in Year Two, $1.5 million in Year Three and $1.8 million in Year Four. Also, in any season that he records four or more interceptions, he gets a $250,000 bonus.

"The Giants were an excellent team last year," Rosenhaus said, "and it's a chance [for Madison] to go to a contender and an opportunity to be a starter." Golly, fellas, if Madison doesn't start there should be an investigation. Right corner Will Allen is not expected to be offered a contract. Left corner Will Peterson isn't sure if he'll ever play again (the stress fracture to the transverse process in his lower back) and right now the starters -- and please use that word loosely -- are last year's second round rookie Corey Webster and journeyman Curtis Deloatch.

"No comment," said Accorsi.

Yeah, but It's a done deal, isn't it? You know his answer. It starts with "No" and ends with "comment."

So now the Giants have a starting corner with experience and a bluechip resume, and if you don't think he's going to start you are probably still waiting for Ron Dayne to make the Pro Bowl. Madison makes it work; Webster moves to the right side and now all the Giants have to hope for is that they find a replacement for the retired (or was he released?) veteran free safety, Brent Alexander.

"No comment," said Accorsi.

Oh, well. The recently settled Collective Bargaining Agreement extension has done a few things that haven't quite made the papers yet. First of all, the teams will have a $102 million salary cap this season, and the feeling here is that if you can't put together a reasonably strong team with all that money, you'll never earn the job as apprentice to George Steinbrenner.

Another is that teams can now sign first round draft picks to five- and six-year contracts, but any player drafted after the first round can sign for no more than four years. Why? Because it prevents the players (a favor to the NFL Players Association) from being bound to a six-year contract, for instance, if they suddenly prove they should have been drafted in the first round instead of the second or third or fourth.

It was a genuine concern that if no agreement was reached and the NFL was cap-free in 2007, some teams would have spent tons and tons of money trying to buy a Super Bowl. That wasn't the real worry, however. It was the recovery period necessary, say, if a new agreement was reached and there was suddenly a cap in 2008. Those high-spending teams wouldn't have the time to get under their enormous payroll that fast.

So one of the proposals in this worst case scenario was to go with a cap in 2008 but a so-called "soft cap" which would allow those teams way, way over it to recover at a somewhat slower pace.

Fortunately, it didn't have to happen.

So now the Giants can concentrate on the draft to find an outside linebacker -- unless they do make a deal with Arrington -- and look for a safety, an offensive tackle and a running back as well.

Oh, and don't forget to wave goodbye to Will Allen.

Check out Dave's website at E-GIANTS where you can subscribe to his newsletters which run much more frequently than what is available here.
- Team Giants

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