Kyler Murray Gets Homework
A weird detail about Kyler Murray’s contract came out on Monday.
“Independent Study” means Player studies the material provided to him by the Club in order to prepare for the Club’s next upcoming game, including without limitation any such material provided via an iPad or other electronic device. Time spent in mandatory meeting shall not constitute Independent Study.
Player shall receive no credit for Independent Study for any period during which Player does not personally study that provided material in good faith. For the avoidance of doubt, Player shall not receive any credit for Independent Study with respect to any periods during which any material is displayed or played on an iPad or other electronic device if (a) Player is not personally studying or watching the material while it is being displayed or played or (b) Player is engaged in any other activity that may distract from his attention (for example watching television playing video games or browsing the internet) while such material is being displayed or played.
The Cardinals wrote into his contract that he has to do literal homework. 4 hours of film study per week. INTENSE STUDY. No distractions, no video games, only zuul. It’s absurd, right? Obviously, the Cardinals would want their star QB to watch film, but to actually bake it into the contract? I can’t believe Murray and his agent were okay with this. The Cardinals are giving him 230 million dollars and are going about it like helicopter parents. If you trust a guy enough to offer him 230 million dollars…just tell him to study film! Be angry with him if he doesn’t! This is like how my mom used to withhold my N64 as a kid during weekdays until I did all my chores.
I feel like this clause might have been leaked by Kyler’s agent as a way to make it effectively unenforceable. It’s a meme now. People are already laughing at the Cardinals for how childish this clause is even though Kyler does have a gamer reputation and once said he doesn’t need to watch film. I feel like that comment was just Kyler humble bragging about how good he is and not particularly serious. They seem to be treating him like he’s JaMarcus Russell. I’m unsure how they are going to enforce it to begin with. Does he have to be on camera while he studies the film? Are they recording the sessions via some internal software tracker? Are they going to ask his mom if he’s been a good boy? How do you enforce something like this?
Obviously, Kyler probably should be doing the studying. Especially past week 8 or so, if history is anything to go by. But if I was him, and the tracking software doesn’t require me to be on camera, I’d rig some sort of device that occasionally hits the pause and rewind buttons to trick his iPad into thinking he’s engaging with it while he goes somewhere else.
It’s wild to think that up to 100 Million dollars is potentially on the line because Kyler needs to do his homework
Also JJ Watt is totally the guy who’d tell the teacher that they forgot to assign homework that day.
(Lol “only zuul”)
It’s anyone’s guess why they put that on there, so I won’t laugh at the Cards for this. It’s quite possible this has been a huge point of contention with them, and maybe Murray is often spotted around the building gaming or goofing off.
There’s someone on my team at work who skates by doing the barest of bare minimums, but at least they’re an entry level employee making dirt. If they suddenly got 6x the money I’m making, you can bet your sweet arse I’d be telling management to put aaaaalll kinds of clauses in there. Because rewarding exceptionally lazy people will absolutely destroy morale. Send his mom in there. Abso-friggo-lutely. If the above isn’t the case, and they’re just trying to get “value” for their pennies, then yes, let us laugh. Just hard to know which it is.
I agree – I think this is potentially a lot more of a bad look for Kyler that they felt the need to put it in there in the first place. The fact that it’s tied to part of his compensation tells me that the team has reason to believe it’s a possibility that he WON’T live up to those standards.
I totally agree. As much as he is overrated, nobody has to tell Tom Brady to study more. And that is why he has excelled.
I’m more worried about what the Cardinals front office is thinking. They just gave a drama queen a massive (and record-setting) contract, whose record is actually sub-par, and they are telling him, “Now, we want you to work a little harder now that we are paying you more.” Paying someone a ridiculous amount of money and telling that same someone they need to work harder now that they are paid, when they have not shown an inkling of working hard in the past… that’s just plain dumb. I think this is gonna blow up in the Cardinals’ faces.
“Hentai Dating Sim”
Ok i peed myself a little
Also, i think the contract details were made to shame kyler into actually studying film, not the other way around.
I’m of hte belief they have that clause as a way to get out of some money if Kyler doesn’t live up to the contract.
For some reason, my mind’s eye told me that your N64 had “Star Wars: Episode I Podracer” in it when your mom took it away. That, or possibly Jet Force Gemini.
Between this contract clause and what came out about Baker Mayfield not doing any game prep on Christmas week, you have to wonder if Lincoln Riley just likes to find quarterbacks with a lot of talent that prep and pay hard when motivated, but aren’t self-starters.
Like, have work-life balance. You don’t have to live football 24/7, but don’t let your craft slip away in favor of your hobbies. Myles Garrett and Wyatt Teller play DnD and make Dragonball fanart and wrestle alligators and stuff, but they still put in the effort to keep playing at a high level while also being goofy dorks.
The problem is these football people who are in the coaching class have lived/breathed football so long they are intensely frustrated any time anyone does something outside of the game. They live in that bubble so long they can’t believe someone wouldn’t be watching game film or reading playbooks. So if they hear anything that is out of the ordinary for them – like gaming, or such – they assume it’s a hinderance.
That hugely depends on the position tho, Myles Garrett doesnt need to be all that good at figuring out what the offensive play is gona be to rush the quarterback so he doesnt have to study nearly as much film as a QB who needs to figure out what the defense is gona do on every single play.
Oh, how we laughed when the Cowboys had to hire a babysitter for Dez Bryant, but it worked. While his peak was short, dude was an absolute monster for 3-4 years.
From reading some comments around the web, they send ipads to players with tracking software so they can know what they watched. Imagine how much money the Raiders could have saved of they had this clause against JaMarcus Russell
Well, they did give him a blank disc to study and when they asked him how he liked it, he said it was great… so they knew.
Man the Cardinals should have held off an extension if they knew Kyler didn’t study.
Why give $230M to a guy if you don’t feel like you can trust him to do some extra studying? Like 4 hours? That’s it? Is that really enough to make a difference after he’s been studying it all day? They probably have like 3-hour-long sessions every weekday anyway. I feel like they would want to avoid burnout because at some point it stops being productive.
In my line of work we talk a lot about “critical distance”, meaning healthy boundaries from your work which can not only give you a chance to recover and end up more receptive to new information, but also give you new perspective on your work by activating other patrs of your brain.
Unfortunately, in the NFL, you get ridiculed for being a polyglot (like Rashard Mendenhall) because you have to be “100% football, 100% of the time”. Let Kyler play with his waifus!
Because kyler is naturally talented… he’s in the ‘damned if you do’/’damned if you don’t’ range of production. Pretty much the worst situation for a team to be in, because if he leaves the team for another team that will give him the cash, you’re screwed too. He has all the leverage.
I know the 49ers have software in their tablets that track usage. The local radio station was talking about it in response to this news that Trey Lance logs in the most time studying film and such through the tablet out of everyone on the team. Hopefully that translates into success on the field, but who can know at this stage? Clearly this has been an issue for Murray, and I get why the Cardinals might want to incentivize him to study. What I don’t get is why they would give a guy so much money if they questioned his work ethic to begin with.
Talent. NFL super star QB talent is hard to find and if you don’t have that then work ethic is irrelevant.
Anyone with eyes know Murray is very talented and has the potential to lead a team or two to a ring. Does he have that next level drive? I think this is the Cards trying to push Murray in that direction and time will tell if it pays off.
A buncha old white guys in boardrooms and sports talk radio saying a black guy is lazy and needs to be held to account. “Next level” should be them surrounding him with the best people to help him succeed and working with him.
Maybe he shouldn’t have gone on the record saying he’s not one of those guys that kills himself watching film.
I did not expect to see a JJ Watt comic in 2022.
There’s a tweet/graph that shows how his production drops every year after Call of Duty is released.
I think a lot of that could be on his coach.
LMAO if THATS the reason for the Cards repeated drop ofs in the 2nd half of the season…..that would be so fuckin funny on so many levels
Can’t wait for comic 1,300.
This makes the “I’m a Big Boy Now” punchline even funnier.
Plot twist, JJ Watt *requested* the homework clause in Kyler’s contract.
The Cardinals have been internet-shamed into removing the independent study clause, citing the distraction that it has created.
Someone should tell Kyle about School Days.