Bates - No Intentions Reporting to Camp or Play on Tag

[*ochocincos*]

The interesting thing about the franchise tag is it's supposed to be enticing enough for a player to want to play on it if they are tagged.
It's the average of the Top 5 player single-season salaries of the position from last year.
However, with the new contracts signed this offseason, Bates is lower than Top 5 paid safety this year, even with the tag.

So with him seeing these new deals and being basically 10th highest paid safety this year based on AAV, it's understandable that he feels the tag isn't enough still.

It is unfortunate he won't be reporting to camp, but until he signs his tag, he's not technically under contract and thus it doesn't make sense to report to camp.