Greg Bedard of the Boston Globe reports that the New England Patriots and WR Wes Welker are roughly $6 million in guarantees apart regarding a long-term contract extension. This comes just after Jason La Canfora of CBS Sports reported that he didn’t â€sense any real motivation†from the Patriots to sign Welker to a long-term deal. Welker is set to make $9.515 million after receiving the Patriots franchise tag back in March. New England would have to pay him a 20 percent increase next year if they choose to tag him for the second consecutive year, so I’m sure that Welker’s agent is using some of these figures to determine the total amount of guaranteed cash included in the deal. The Patriots have been known to part with players before they’ve started to decline, so there’s no guarantee that Welker will be locked up before the July 16th deadline or even during the offseason next year, considering that $6 million is still a huge gap. Source: NFL Trade Rumors
