It hasn’t exactly been a secret, but what seemed likely when the season started moved a step closer to reality Friday night. Reports out of New Orleans indicate that Drew Brees has restructured his contract to provide the Saints with some cap relief “if” he retires.
Per league source the #Saints have renegotiated Drew Brees’ contract to open up nearly $24M in cap space for 2021.
— Jason_OTC (@Jason_OTC) February 6, 2021
Most likely accomplished this way: Brees agreed to drop his base salary for 2021 to the league minimum (the salary is moot with retirement on the horizon).
This allows the Saints the $24M in wiggle room (they’ll need all of it) to utilize before June 1 in free agency. https://t.co/zBg4i4c1Uk
— Field Yates (@FieldYates) February 6, 2021
I, for one, will miss him.
Although he was drafted in 2001 by the San Diego Chargers, Brees will forever be remembered as a New Orleans Saint. And one of saintliest Saints at that.
Brees led the NFL in passing yards a remarkable 7 times, including 2016 when he threw for a career-high 5,208 yards. That was one of five seasons that he passed the 5k mark. He had two others that ended with 4,952 yards (2014) and 4,870 yards (2015).
Even more remarkably, he completed more than 70% of his passes in SEVEN different seasons; including each of his final the last five.
If indeed he does retire, he will retire with the most passing yards in NFL history (80,358) which puts him 1,154 yards ahead of Tom Brady (who would surely break it by playing next season) and an incredible 8,418 yards ahead of Peyton Manning.
Brees also ranks second all-time in passing touchdowns (571), second in completion percentage (67.7%), and fifth in QB rating (98.7%).
Quite the career.
The Hall of Fame in Canton, Ohio already has him measured for his gold jacket.
I’ll close with the best quote I’ve ever heard or seen about Drew Brees. It came from Hall of Famer Marshall Faulk who said:
The Saints made the right decision signing Drew Brees — not just in terms of his arm, because of his heart and mind.”