ESPN Says Dolphins Made Jason Taylor an Offer, His Agent Says Otherwise

By Kyle Munzenrieder Thu., Apr. 22 2010 at 12:31 PM

Categories: Sports

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Fans are the biggest losers in Jason Taylor's decision to head to the Jets, but we're still not sure exactly with whom to be angry: Taylor for heading out of town or Bill Parcels and company for apparently not caring too much that Taylor was packing his bags.

This morning, ESPN reported the Dolphins actually had made Taylor an offer, though one not quite as sweet as the Jets'. The source claims the Fins offered to boost Taylor's base salary to slightly more than $2 million a year shortly after the 2009 season. Though that's a far cry from the $13 million he could potentially make for two years with the Jets.

But Taylor's agent, Gary Wichard, disputes the report with the Sun-Sentinel and says the only offer JT received was during the season, not after, as ESPN reports.

"Once the season was over, so was the offer," Wichard said.

Taylor did make a reference to the November offer in a press conference yesterday.

"If I was important enough that you wanted me in November, why wouldn't you want me now?" Taylor said during the conference. "But that's their prerogative. They're allowed to make that decision. There is a business side to football, and if they feel that it's better for their team to not have me, that's fine. I have no problem with that. That's part of the game. Just let me know."

Apparently, no one let Taylor or his agent know there was any interest or offer since the Fins season ended.

"No one on the Dolphins' side (publicly or privately) has told me that there was an official offer on table at any point since the season. I did ask the question repeatedly, and to more than one person, assuming that if some offer had existed, it would benefit the Dolphins (for public relations purposes) to let it out," Wichard said.

Though Taylor did say he had a meeting scheduled with coach Tony Sparano last week but that the Dolphins cancelled it.

One of our commenters makes the only analysis that really makes sense at this point: "The Dolphins are actually using him as a spy, but you didn't hear it from me. Parcells and Taylor made it look like they weren't talking, but they're paying him on the side to feed the Dolphins intel."

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