Tag is 16.3, any trade partners know you're up against it

This one, Spotrac, doesn't list him. Only in the dead cap space. Over the cap still has him in, but they only have us at 6.8 million in cap space too. Not sure which one is more accurate.

Agreed. It’s not happening. Not with $40+ for Mahomes staring us in the face

Well maybe we can give him a couple of 96 roll packages of toilet paper to reduce his number. o:-)

The new CBA allots a 1.5 million cap exemption per veteran player with over 4 years on KC's roster.

This, in theory, gives the Chiefs $12 mil in relief...Jones just completed year 4.

You didn't ask this question in official CP format.

<blockquote class="twitter-tweet"><p lang="en" dir="ltr">No surprise, but Chiefs are placing franchise tag on DT Chris Jones today, per source.</p>&mdash; Adam Schefter (@AdamSchefter) <a href="https://twitter.com/AdamSchefter/status/1239530220245352449?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">March 16, 2020</a></blockquote> <script async src="https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js" charset="utf-8"></script>

Jones tagged.

https://lastwordonprofootball.com/20...gc4oq25OvKyMsw

Assessing the Chiefs' options with Chris Jones following the Colts' trade for DeForest Buckner

By Eric Eager

We’re into the second week of free agency, and for the defending Super Bowl champion Kansas City Chiefs, it’s been a quiet ride. Gone are starters Kendall Fuller and Stefen Wisniewski, and in are Mike Remmers and former XFL star Jordan Ta’amu. Sammy Watkins and his big ($21 million) cap number remain on the roster, while the Chiefs' ability to do much else is hampered substantially by having under $400,000 in cap space per our friends at OverTheCap.

The elephant in the room, as it has been since the end of the season, is star interior lineman Chris Jones, the fourth-most valuable defensive tackle in the NFL since he entered the league as a second-round pick in 2016. As we wrote about last month, the Chiefs were a bit hamstrung with options for retaining Jones prior to when free agency started, as he was reportedly commanding Aaron Donald ($22.5 million APY) money and a long-term deal. The Chiefs already invested two draft picks and a five-year, $105.7 million last offseason into edge player Frank Clark, further complicating matters.

As such, Kansas City applied the franchise tag to Jones ($16.1 million) and were likely trying to trade him to a defense-needy team for a draft pick in the late first round or early second round. Such designs were thwarted a bit early last week, when the Indianapolis Colts traded the 13th-overall pick to the San Francisco 49ers for DeForest Buckner and then promptly gave him a deal worth $84 million over four years. Where it matters most, Jones is a better player than Buckner, putting up five more pressures on more than 300 fewer pass-rushing snaps than the former Oregon Duck, while playing on a far less-talented defensive line. Thus, a reasonable valuation of Jones would be $21 million APY and a top-15 pick after this move, neither of which is likely to be realized. So what should they do?

IGNORE THE COLTS' DEAL FOR BUCKNER

Markets tend toward efficiency, but the market for NFL players is a) not stationary, b) not big and c) not necessarily made up of completely rational actors. While we like the overall direction of the Colts under Chris Ballard, the Buckner deal was an overpay both in terms of draft-pick compensation and contract. George Chahrouri and I left all interior defenders off our analytics mock, and for good reason: Interior players do not provide the value play-for-play that mirrors even edge players, and coverage is more valuable than the play of both. The same applies to handing out big contracts to interior players: don’t do it.

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With Chris being on the non exclusive tag and the Colts moving a high pick and big cap space for Buckner, Jones agent can argue much. He can’t say “the fact a team has to give up a big pick along with a contract makes getting a fair deal done impossible” because Buckner was traded for a premium pick and a huge deal.

Chris is obviously finding out what his true value is.

Hopefully that leads to a big extension that he deserves.

NFL.com listed his projected contract as 5 years and $101.5 million.

Something I know for sure is Mahomes contacted Sammy and Chris and is willing to do a Mahometown discount to keep both in KC. The part that’s taking so long is the structure of all 3 deals so there is cap flexibility in the future and finding deals that satisfy all 3.

If all 3 are reasonable, I expect all 3 deals to be announced within a week of each other.

The hang up is possibly the upcoming TV deals due to the coronavirus complicating the amount the deals are negotiated for in many ways.

Everybody looks at the reported amount of the Aaron Donald deal and not the whole deal. The total years Donald signed for was 7, not 6.

The total reported amount is 6/135 to make it look huge, but he actually signed a total deal of 7/142.

If he’d sign it, I’d give him that deal immediately

Mahomes won’t get done until next year.

He might sign an EXTENSION this year to his existing contract once the 5th year option is exercised.