Thread: Bears' Gould could cash in on new rules

Originally Posted by dabears54

Bears' Gould could cash in on new rules

By Brad Biggs Tribune reporter 11:53 a.m. CDT, April 25, 2011




New special teams rules adopted by the NFL at the owners meeting last month will not help the Chicago Bears. The kickoff line has been moved up from the 30- to the 35-yard line, and special teams coordinator Dave Toub said he expects touchbacks to rise from 16.7 percent last season to close to 50 percent in 2011.


One player the new rules will benefit is Bears kicker Robbie Gould. He has an escalator in his contract that rewards him for touchbacks. However, Gould also had no problem reaching the threshold the last three seasons with kickoffs at the 30-yard line.

The clause in Gould’s contract pays him $62,500 more in his 2012 base salary for each season from 2008 through 2011 that he has at least eight touchbacks. Gould had a career-high 16 last season. He had eight touchbacks in 2009 and nine in 2008 after making only three in 2007 before signing his six-year extension in May 2008. The maximum value for the deal is $15.5 million, and at the time it made him the highest-paid kicker in the NFL.

Suffice to say, hitting eight touchbacks shouldn’t be an issue for Gould now and it will pay off for him in 2013 too as the escalator is also tied to his base salary for that season.

Gould can trigger a maximum of $950,000 in escalators for 2012 and he can tack on as much as $1.1 million in 2013 to his base salary. Gould receives an additional $37,500 in base pay in 2012 for each season from 2008 through 2011 that his field goal percentage is 83 percent or better. He has been above that mark every year but his rookie season of 2005.

There is a $125,000 escalator for each season in which his field goal percentage is 88 percent or better. He hit that in 2008 when he had a career-best 89.7 percent mark, converting 26 of 29 field goals.

bmbiggs@tribune.com

Well if Robbie is getting paid like one of the top PK then it's time for Toub to be paid like one of the top ST co-ordinators. That's coach we don't want to lose.

Originally Posted by dabears54

Which is why want to see the rest of that story.. that lovie a top paid coach, players like peppers, urlacher gould, maynard at the top salary or near at their positions, dosn't make sense toub isn't..

No, it doesn't does it? Well like I said, he's in the fold for 2011 so we can take a wait see on this one and Martz.

Originally Posted by dabears54

and honestly we do not even know toub's salary for 201 o or 2011.. he could be the highst paid ST coach( or close to top now).. and giving him a "minimal raise" from alrady being up there is logical. .. as said would love to see mully or another writer actually put some FACTS and real numbes behind the wild conjecture

Yeah but the problem is that he isn't anywhere near the highest paid ST coach. It's true that we don't know exactly what his salary is, I researched it and couldn't find anything, but we do know that he's not even one the top 10 and I believe he deserves to be. Don't you?

Even this article quotes Mulligan and his undisclosed source as the source from which this statement was taken but it doesn't stretch my imagination to think that it may be true. But just how much spread there seems to be between what he was "offered" and what the top guy makes we don't know. Like I've said I take a wait and see attitude about it all. There's plenty of time to go before it becomes a crisis if it even does at all.
BBAO: Dave Toub's future with the Bears

April, 25, 2011 Apr 25
7:30
AM ET

• Email
• Print
• Comments44

By Kevin Seifert


We're Black and Blue All Over:

We spent considerable time this offseason discussing the Chicago Bears' refusal to grant offensive line coach Mike Tice permission to interview for the Tennessee Titans' offensive coordinator job. Shortly thereafter, the Bears adjusted Tice's contract to add another year and, presumably, more money.

Mike Mulligan of the Chicago Sun-Times notes that the Bears didn't have as much success locking up another highly regarded assistant coach. Special teams coordinator Dave Toub turned down a contract extension because the Bears offered him what a source told Mulligan was a "minimal raise" that would not have put him among the top 10 highest-paid special teams coaches in the NFL.

I know no one wants to hear NFL coaches or players pleading poverty given their six-figure salaries, and it should be noted that Toub has made no public statement of dissatisfaction. The Bears certainly weren't obligated to give Toub a raise at a time of economic uncertainty caused by the lockout.

But as we always like to say, action and inaction have consequences. In this case, Toub's contract will expire after the 2011 season, making him eligible to leave the organization for another opportunity if he wants.