Fletcher Cox's Agent Todd France Goes Off On Howard Eskin
PHILADELPHIA (CBS) -- Fletcher Cox's agent, Todd France, is fuming.
Howard Eskin reported that Cox turned down $60 million guaranteed adding that, "I've been told that people think [France is] brutal and he's a tough guy."
France joined the 94WIP Mike & Ike Show on Tuesday to sound off on Eskin, refuting his report.
"I'm 44 years old. You think I enjoy people -- I shouldn't say people -- a person talking about me with this kind of misinformation and framing it in a certain way?" France said passionately. "No, it makes me want to be that tough guy that you guys told me I was and throw on the boxing gloves and say let's go at it Howard, let's go.
Listen: Todd France on the 94WIP MIke & Ike Show
"What's amazing to me, is that today's day and age you can report something and absolutely make no attempt to contact the other party -- perhaps in this case maybe the agent -- and ask him, 'Hey this is the information I'm getting. Is this true, is this not true?' If I choose not to comment or don't respond, then that's on me. But to me, it's careless reporting when you don't even attempt to check your facts that are quote-unquote -- that are facts -- I should put those in quotes."
"I just felt like, you know what, enough is enough," France told Michael Barkann and Ike Reese on 94WIP. "I can't just let this guy go on a rant and speak what he wants to speak."
France couldn't resist attacking Eskin again throughout the 17-minute interview, later calling his report "careless."
"For Howard Eskin to come out and say how insane it is and how ridiculous it is -- and then to have a personal attack on me, when I literally don't know if I've ever talked to the guy. OK? And if it was it's gotta be years, and years, and years and it surely wasn't about this. I think it's unfair to myself, I think it's unfair to Fletcher Cox to put out that type of misinformation. And you know who else it's unfair to? The fans. Because you're misleading your Philly fan base."
"To me it's just wrong, careless, and bad reporting. That's my opinion because I actually know the facts."
France explained why $60 million guaranteed isn't always necessarily $60 million guaranteed in the NFL, stating there are many layers to a contract.
"To say a contract is worth -- whatever I'm gonna use $60 million guaranteed -- and a certain amount of it he gets today, but the next year he gets some if he's on the roster is guaranteed," said France. "And the next year he gets it guaranteed if he's on the roster then. And the next year he gets it if he's on the roster -- those are year-to-year guarantees.
"Any person that's got any intelligence to the football business will write and say, 'That really isn't X amount guaranteed.' Because the team can do what? Get rid of the guy and cut him at any point and that quote-unquote guaranteed money the player never really receives."
So does Cox want to stay in Philadelphia?
"One hundred percent of course he does," France said emphatically. "It's the team that drafted him, it's the team that believed in him coming out of college. He's grown there. Yeah they've gone through some changes and all that kind of stuff. But he's grown as a person, he's grown as a player. He's ecstatic with what [new defensive coordinator] Jim Schwartz is going to bring to the table. With the scheme that is coming it's like literally a scheme made for Fletcher. So I think it's gonna be scary in terms of what his trajectory is going to be, in terms of what he is going to be on the field. He's young. I mean, guy is 25-years-old. So his best football is obviously in front of him still."
Eskin went back at France on Tuesday's 94WIP Josh Innes Show.
"Where did he come forth with the truth?" Eskin told Innes. "That might have been the worst interview in the history of broadcasting this afternoon. It was a chuckle fest. Here, you get an agent on, you gotta pin his ass down. You don't have to get me specific numbers -- is there there more than $60 million guaranteed? And his response was, 'Well there's different thing that go into the contract.'
He never came out with any hard evidence that I was incorrect, other than he said it was bad reporting. Again, most agents never really are honest with you."
