They would have done it by now if they were going to and it's not "much cheaper" than the franchise tag. If the $19 mil figure in the OP is accurate, it would be about $3 mil cheaper than the franchise tag which would be about $22 mil. By not exercising it and reserving the use of the franchise tag if need be instead, you can just treat the $3 mil difference as a premium for not having to worry about him getting injured and owing a QB you have no interest in $19 million the following year. And rest assured if Blake has a season ending injury this year, he's pretty much done here just the same as if he doesn't fix his decision making and clean up his release. That's $3 million well spent if they feel compelled to franchise him versus a potential waste of $19 mil with the option.


The only drawback is the number of quality players we have hitting free agency next year and trying to keep them all here. The whole idea of considering the 5th year option as a means to keep Blake here 3 more years with successive franchise tags is getting way ahead of ourselves though. You'd worry about something like that with a QB coming off a good year, not the year Blake had.

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