Free-agent wide receiver Tiquan Underwood has signed with the Hamilton Tiger-Cats of the Canadian Football League, NFL.com reports.
Underwood didn't see any NFL action in 2014 after being released by the Panthers last August. He has caught 63 passes for 1,006 yards with six touchdowns in 45 games over five seasons with the Jaguars, Patriots and Buccaneers.
Why do you have to talk like that 'Dork? Bakari Grant is a much beloved and long tenured member of the Hamilton Tiger-Cats. I guess you don't remember that he gave the first TD ball ever scored at Tim Hortons Field to owner Bob Young. Jeez!!!
Hard luck guy, after being cut by all the NFL teams he ever played for. When a member of the Patriots, he was cut just hours before the the team was to play in the Super Bowl. :? :cowboy:
I have always wondered how this works and maybe someone more knowledgeable can tell me. But maybe a player who is on the Cats negotiation list can say he wants to play in the CFL and the Cats either have to offer him a minimum contract or take him off the negotiation list. So it might be that the Cats weren't particularly interested in another international receiver right now but Underwood started the process so they decided to take a look.
A player remains on a team's neg list until that team decides to remove his name from that list. No team has to offer that player a minimum contract or remove him from the list if he wants to play for another team. They could always arrange a trade of neg list players if they wanted to.
A member Club shall be permitted to retain a player's name on its negotiation list for an indefinite period. However, if the player is in a free agent status and has notified the Club of a willingness to enter into negotiations to sign a Standard Player Contract the Club shall be required to offer the player a contract and thereafter remove the player's name from its negotiation list as follows:
(a) not later than ten days following the receipt of such notification from the player if the Club is not prepared to offer a contract, or
(b) not later than 365 days after the date of offer by the Club if the terms of the contract can be deemed by the Commissioner to be reasonable, or
(c) forthwith if the terms of the contract offered by the Club are deemed by the Commissioner not to be reasonable.
(Fenderguy beat me to the punch on posting the neg list rule by one minute.)
Basically, if a neg list player decides to play in the CFL, he is told he must contact the team that has his rights. That team must make an off within ten days. If the player accepts the offer, he comes to camp and either makes the team or not. If he doesn't make the team, he'll then be a free agent (unless another team adds him to their neg list). But if he doesn't accept the team's offer, and the league determines that the offer is reasonable, the player can't sign with any other team for a year.
So yes, teams make the offer to avoid dropping the player's rights. Also, if they thought the player was worth adding to their neg list, they probably think he's good enough for a tryout.
By no means am I saying that the player in question is a "camp body" but you will see many more of these types of signings. When training camp opens, they tend to have as close to 3 different offensive units, especially the receiver groupings. They have 9 Receivers on the roster at present including Brandon Banks. They'll probably add another 4 or 5 so that they have three - five rec units rotating & out during smelly drills & full team drills.
Lol me and my one friend have always loved Underwood because he had the best high top haircut in sports, looked like he was straight out of the 80s. But honestly decent signing, not like we are searching for replacements for our starters but he could turn out to be a nice surprise. Never hurts to add more talent.
EDIT: but seriously, we just added a legendary hairdoo. People arent respecting this signing for what it adds aesthetically to our team.
Players who qualify as CFL veterans (have appeared on a game roster, reserve list or injury list for seven games) are not allowed to be placed on a neg list. Veteran players are free agents and able to negotiate with any team when their contract has expired or they have been released and cleared waivers.
Full details can be found here: [url=http://media.cfldb.ca/documents/appendix-e-part-1-cfl-by-laws.pdf]http://media.cfldb.ca/documents/appendi ... y-laws.pdf[/url]
