Singletary: 49ers May Change Crabtree Offer

While San Francisco 49ers rookie holdout Michael Crabtree celebrates his birthday, the 49ers are mulling a deal that would either provide him or deny him what he's wishing for when he blows out the candles.

Coach Mike Singletary said in a Monday press conference that the 49ers were considering altering deal on the 5-year, $20 million offer they have on the table for Crabtree. Coach Singletary would not say whether the Niners are considering offering Crabtree more -- or less -- money on a new deal.

Whether the 49ers will now offer Crabtree more money or less money is the five-year, $20 million question. There are two ways to read the tea leaves, rumors, and various Twitter dispatches of the last 48 hours.

One is to guess that the 49ers will increase their offer to Crabtree, as Crab's people spent Sunday huffing and puffing off the record to NFL reporters that Crabtree is as determined as ever to sit out the season if he doesn't get a better offer. "Expectations at this time," Adam Schefter tweeted, before going on ESPN and reiterating the same information, "At this time being the key phrase -- are that Crabtree could wind up sitting out season and re-entering draft."

The other guess is that, true to York family philosophy, the offer will get smaller and smaller.  After all, they now know they can win without him.

• Santa Rosa Press-Democrat 49ers writer Matt Maiocco tweets with certainty that he thinks the "modified offer" would be for either less overall money or for more years.
• Yahoo! Sports writer Michael Silver wrote Monday that a 49ers team source informs him, "The team just reduced its offer, and it will continue to do so with each passing week."
• And the Mercury News' Tim Kawakami is using his Twitter account to make educated guesses on how much of a pay cut Crabtree would get, before Crabtree has even been given the pay cut.

Trying to infer the size of a guy's proposed pay cut on a contract we don't know about for sure my seem a little presumptuous . But if he's still holding out, then those are the only Michael Crabtree fantasy numbers we have to work with on Mondays.

 Joe Kukura is a freelance writer who has already proposed a do-over to his Fantasy Commissioner on that Michael Crabtree pick.

Copyright NBC Owned Television Stations

Leave Comments