NY Giants would be wise to approach Markus Golden about extension

What could a potential Markus Golden extension look like for NY Giants?

Earlier in the offseason and before free agency, I speculated that a Markus Golden contract extension would cost the NY Giants somewhere between $10M-$12M over a four-year period, likely with fewer guarantees than usual.

It’s clear that he didn’t approach anywhere near that kind of number on the open market, and with the NY Giants now knowing that they should pounce here and try to rectify this situation for both parties in the long term, not just for Big Blue in 2020.

They can begin to work off that $4.2M that Golden is guaranteed for 2020 as a guaranteed floor, and let’s just say we about double that to around $10M. Right away, no matter the number of years of his APY, Golden has to feel happier as he is guaranteed $10M which will set him and his family up for life.

Now, the trickier but less important part, his APY and term length. I think three years and $22M sound fair at this point, maybe with some double-digit sack incentives and Pro Bowl incentives thrown in for good measure.

A three-year, $22M contract ($7.3M per) with just $10M guaranteed for a player of Markus Golden’s caliber? That would be a home run for both sides at this point, as Golden has almost no recourse to holding out after finding out no team was willing to give him even $4.2M over one season in 2020.

The NY Giants have hundreds of millions of dollar of cap space opening up over the next several years, that contract would look like an absolute steal as soon as next season and make for a much-happier Markus Golden in 2020 as again, he already did the whole one-year prove-it thing with the NY Giants in 2019.

There’s a chance that Big Blue just tacks on another million or two to make him happy for 2020 – at least in terms of incentives – but if you’re going to do that, why not just approach his team about an extension in general?

Joe Judge already has spoken glowingly about Markus Golden during this process, something he hadn’t even been willing to do for his own players.

With the team not having an alpha, number-one type pass rusher at the moment, why not guarantee yourselves the prospects of having one side of their edge-rushing group set, now, for more than more year?

The team also just happened to free up about $3M in cap space by releasing Aldrick Rosas, making it easy to slide in an extra $3M on the books on top of his already guaranteed (if he signs the tender) $4.2M salary for 2020.

This seems like a win for all involved, and although the NY Giants will likely stand pat and take their victory here for 2020, it would be nice to see some forward-thinking here.

Taking care of a guy that signed a one-year prove-it deal and balled out while never taking a playoff in a lost season would send a positive message to the locker room as well.

To me, this is a no brainer scenario.