This morning, Devin McCourty agreed to terms on a five year contract with the New England Patriots. We now have his contract information, courtesy of Mike Reiss of ESPNBoston.com.
The deal, as previously reported, will be for five years. It holds a maximum value of $13.2 million. $7.285 million is guaranteed.
The reason the contract details of this deal are so important is because Devin McCourty is just the second 1st round pick to sign from this year's first round class. Therefore, it will be interesting to see how much McCourty gets up front via a signing bonus, as well as if McCourty received a one-time option bonus similar to what Rob Gronkowski and Dez Bryant received. McCourty's contract is sure to be heavily analyzed, as it will help other first round picks around the league in signing their respective deals.
We will update you with more contract details as they become available.
Update: For those wondering, ColtsCap.net has details of the contract signed by last years 27th overall pick, Donald Brown. Interestingly, he did receive a $3.26 million option bonus. The total maximum value of his contract was $12.835 million, which means McCourty received about a 2.8% raise off of Donald Brown's contract. So McCourty's value was pretty close to the standard 3% as well as the projected $13.13 million that Richard Hill previously predicted.
Update 2: Albert Breer of the Globe has posted the official numbers for McCourty's contract. The base salaries are minimum and guaranteed, starting with a $320,000 base salary and finishing with a $870,000 base salary in 2014. McCourty receives a $1.5 million signing bonus as well as a $680,000 roster bonus for 2010. He also has a one-time play-time incentive of $1.54 million. Like Dez Bryant and Rob Gronkowski, McCourty has a large option bonus due in 2011 for $3.38 million. As Breer points out, the option bonus is essentially guaranteed, because should the team cut McCourty, they would owe him over five million for 2011.