It's been a long and somewhat confusing free agency period for the San Francisco 49ers. More accurately, it's been long and confusing for their fans, who have had to follow along while their team tries to court Peyton Manning. That's all over now, and the horrible, broken relationship with all of the hurt feelings and face-slapping between Jim Harbaugh and Alex Smith has been mended.
That was sarcasm, if you didn't catch that - a nod to the folks who have been putting way too much emotion into the business side of things. So let's just pass that on by and get to more business-related things. The 49ers had a reported offer of around $24 million over three years for Smith during the Manning saga, so it was assumed his eventual contract would look a bit like that.
Janie McCauley is reporting via Twitter that Smith's deal is worth $33 million altogether. It confirms a three-year deal, with $8 million per season and $16.5 million guaranteed. This fits the bill of three years at $24 million, with the other $9 million or so coming from incentives. None of this is confirmed, but it is a solid launching point for the discussion and the numbers seem pretty accurate.
What's going to be interesting is seeing what Alex's year one cap hit is, and how much space the 49ers have to make some moves. They've got a decent amount of space left, but still don't have a right guard and will have to sign all of their draft picks. It'll be interesting to see what year three looks like, as most assume it will be time for Colin Kaepernick by then.