Pat McAfee: Baker Mayfield Contract Negotiations Blown Out Of Proportion
June 14th, 2026
Convinced Bucs, Baker Mayfield will come to terms.
Former All-Pro punter and current sports talk megastar Pat McAfee seems to be chuckling to himself about all the chatter about the Baker Mayfield contract extension talks.
McAfee scoffed at claims negotiations are not going well, saying, “This is not abnormal. I think people tried to make this seem like this was a bigger deal than it actually was.”
To be clear, as SI.com NFL columnist Albert Breer pointed out last week, the Bucs floated a contract offer to Mayfield and his camp had yet to respond so it wasn’t a negotiation. Of course, that could have changed already.
McAfee noted Jason Licht said on McAfee’s BSPN show how much he loves Mayfield and wants him long-term, and how Mayfield has said he loves Tampa.
McAfee is confident the two sides will work out a contract extension.
“This news comes out and get [people] a little bit worried,” McAfee said. “I don’t think we’re anywhere near done negotiating.”
Most players don’t want to negotiate during the season to avoid the drama that goes with that in-season, McAfee said. So Mayfield saying he would cut off talks once training camp starts sounds normal to McAfee.
“I don’t think it’s necessarily the most negative thing on earth that this is happening,” McAfee said.
Joe absolutely agrees with everything McAfee says here. It may not be this summer; it may be next winter, it could be next spring, but Joe is confident that when Week 1 of the 2027 rolls around, Mayfield will be your Bucs starting quarterback.
June 14th, 2026 at 11:19 am
Concur.
June 14th, 2026 at 11:21 am
Yep !
JL is just waiting for the day before training camp
Accidents can happen and no sense in signing a contract before he is ready to go to work
June 14th, 2026 at 11:24 am
ALL of this is in response to a couple sentences by Baker
June 14th, 2026 at 11:56 am
Test 1—2 Test 1—2
Submit comment” and the comment disappears and the page returns to the story headline with nothing posted.
June 14th, 2026 at 11:58 am
JA !
I had that happen twice yesterday morning.
It’s happened other times as well.
June 14th, 2026 at 12:09 pm
If 2-7 Baker is the real Baker, he will not be starting for anyone in 2027.
If Baker gags in prime time and crucial must win games in the 4th quarter again, he should not be a Buccaneer.
His play should determine his future.
June 14th, 2026 at 1:35 pm
The only thing more boring than the endless speculation over Baker Mayfield’s. Contract is articles about Mike Evans leaving….
June 14th, 2026 at 2:20 pm
@TBBF, let’s combine your 2 favorite topics!
Didn’t Jason say the same thing about ME13, and didn’t Mike also share his “love” of Tampa. Buccaneer for life….enter Magoo, JL, and his Murphy’s Law manifesto
June 14th, 2026 at 3:29 pm
Baker played for $4M his first year and we won a playoff game. Pay the man!
June 14th, 2026 at 3:50 pm
I like Baker Mayfield he is exciting to watch sometimes. And then sometimes he throws 4 interceptions and doesn’t play well altogether. His accuracy is terrible and that’s something he should be constantly working on to get better at. I also don’t hear any stories about him working with our receivers in the offseason to get in sync with them, the best quarterbacks always have done those things to be on top. IMHO I just don’t think Mayfield is elite, when he could be and should be.
June 14th, 2026 at 3:52 pm
3rd and 28 is why ME13 is gone, if the HC was replaced ME13 would be here.
Bake is in a different situation.
June 14th, 2026 at 6:00 pm
Big problems going on with this site. You can’t get half your comments to go through. At least I now see that I am not the only one. I knew I couldn’t be though, the more times it’s happened. Hell, I’ll be real surprised IF this one even goes through, at this point.
June 14th, 2026 at 6:01 pm
Well, it did actually!!!!!!!!!!
June 14th, 2026 at 6:46 pm
The man struggled 1 half season in the 4 years hes been in Tampa, and if think injuries didn’t help the situation your delusional
June 14th, 2026 at 8:26 pm
During his last contract negotiations Mike Evans also said that if a contract wasn’t signed before training camp that he would cut off negotiations and would into free agency. There was no contract sign before free agency. Jason did not cave in. And Mike Evans did not sign with another team.
Jason is smart to wait until after the season specifically because of the way Mayfield end of the season. He seems to get hurt every year and that causes this team to limp to the finish line because the coaches are afraid to put in a backup quarterback, which does not give Baker time to heal adequately.
So, if it happens again this year, I would expect that either Baker signs a lesser contract than he is anticipating or we will have a different quarterback on the center next year.
I also believe that Jalen Darden might end up being our next quarterback that is based on the film. I have watched on him and on Joe’s description of his play and practice or shall we say underwear football
June 14th, 2026 at 9:30 pm
Joe trusts you meant Jalon Daniels?
Joe doesn’t want to see Jaelon Darden anywhere near One Buc Palace again. Though he’d likely be a better quarterback than he was a receiver.
June 14th, 2026 at 11:14 pm
Just the mention of the name Darden gives me hives.
June 15th, 2026 at 1:56 pm
I’ve thought this since the first audio dropped. Baker wasn’t laying the gauntlet down and being a hard@$$. He was saying that when training camp starts, his mind is on football.
I doubt he’s “insulted” as some are implying. That’s just negotiation. He’s shooting for the moon while the team shoots for the floor. Very standard contract negotiation opening gambits. In reality, they’re probably only a couple of million dollars apart, maybe disagreeing about the number of years on the contract.