Jason Cole of B/R reports that the Rams free agent CB Janoris Jenkins has fired his agent, despite being in negotiations with Los Angeles regarding a contract extension.
Jenkins won’t be able to hire a new agent for five days, and while the Rams can speak to him during this time, Cole expects Jenkins to not want to hear from them and their offers.
According to Cole, the Rams offered him a five-year, $45 million contract, but he found that to be unacceptable.
With this in mind, this will make it tough for the Rams to get him under contract before he can meet with prospective teams during the legal-tampering period. To matters even more difficult, Cole expects Jenkins to hire Darrelle Revis‘ agent, who has negotiated some massive contracts for his clients in the past.
Los Angeles was hoping to keep Jenkins and CB Trumaine Johnson, but it sounds like there’s a chance he could end up reaching the open market.
Recent reports have said that the Rams are prepared their franchise tag on either Jenkins or Johnson with Johnson being the more likely of the two.
Rams HC Jeff Fisher mentioned a few days ago that he is hoping to “sign my secondary” with their huge amount of cap space, per Nick Wagoner.
Los Angeles released DE Chris Long, LB James Laurinaitis, and TE Jared Cook last week, which leaves them among the teams with the most cap space to work with at nearly $60 million to work with, so it’s conceivable that they could keep both Jenkins and Johnson.
Jenkins, 26, was taken in the second round of the 2012 draft and has one year remaining on his four-year, $4.99 million rookie contract that included $2.964 million guaranteed. He’ll make a base salary of just $660,000 for the 2015 season, so you can see that he’s in line for a substantial raise next year.
In 2015, Jenkins appeared in 15 games and recorded 64 tackles, three interceptions, a forced fumble, and 15 pass defenses for the Rams. Pro Football Focus has him rated as the No. 26 cornerback out of 111 qualifying players.
Johnson, 26, is a former third-round pick of the Rams back in 2012. He’s played out his rookie contract and is now in position to be one of the best available cornerbacks in this year’s free agent class.
In 2015, Johnson appeared in 14 games and recorded 71 tackles, seven interceptions with one being returned for a touchdown, a fumble recovery and 17 pass defenses. Pro Football Focus has him rated as the No. 19 cornerback out of 111 qualifying players.
We have both players featured in our Top 100 – 2016 Free Agents list.
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