Richard Sherman is his own agent; here's the reported deal he negotiated with 49ers

Richard Sherman's free agency tour didn't turn out to be much of a tour. After spending the weekend in San Francisco, Sherman and his agent were so impressed with the 49ers that they decided to agree to a deal on the spot.

Of course, when we say that "Sherman and his agent were impressed," we actually mean just Sherman and that's because the former Seahawks cornerback serves as his own agent. That means it was Sherman, and Sherman alone, who negotiated the reported three-year deal with the 49ers on Saturday.

So what kind of deal did Sherman the agent hammer out for Sherman the player?

Well, let's just say that Sherman is definitely going to have to earn his money and that's because his three-year contract is an incentive-laden deal that could be worth up to $39 million, but might not be worth much if he doesn't meet those incentives.

Sherman will be getting a $5 million signing bonus and a $2 million base salary for 2018, but he's basically going to have to earn everything else after that. According to NFL.com, Sherman will be making $125,000 per week in 46-man roster bonuses, which means, if Sherman is on the active roster for all 16 games in 2018, he'll get a total of $2 million.

That active roster bonus is likely due to the fact that the 49ers have no way of knowing if he'll be ready for the 2018 season. Sherman missed seven games in 2017 after tearing his right Achilles tendon and also had to have surgery on his left leg this offseason to clean out bone spurs.

The recovery timeline for an injury like that is generally 10 to 12 months, which means Sherman might not be ready for the beginning of the 2018 season. However, ESPN.com noted on Saturday that Sherman and the 49ers both expect him to be ready for training camp, which would be a highly impressive recovery timeline.

Besides the active roster bonus, Sherman is scheduled to get a $1 million playing-time incentive. Although it's not clear what the incentive is yet, it could be something as simple as, if he's on the field for 80 percent of the 49ers' defensive plays in 2018 then he gets the $1 million. Playing time incentives are simply tied to the percentage of snaps when a player is on the field during the regular season.

Sherman can also earn a $3 million bonus if he's voted to the Pro Bowl (Pro Football Talk noted that there's some minor confusion here and that it might be a $3 million bonus for being named an All-Pro, which is much more difficult).

If you're scoring at home, that means Sherman could make as much as $13 million during the first year of his deal ($5 million signing bonus, $2 million base salary, $2 million roster bonus, $1 million playing time bonus and $3 million Pro Bowl/All-Pro bonus).

That last bonus is the one you want to keep an eye on, because if Sherman hits that it will basically tie him to the 49ers until 2020. According to NFL.com, if Sherman is named an All-Pro in 2018, a total of $16 million in base salary for 2019 and 2020 will become fully guaranteed.

Basically, Sherman is going to have to have a huge year if he wants to get the full value of his contract, and that's not going to be easy, considering Week 1 of the 2018 season is being played less than 10 months after his Achilles injury.

On the other hand, there's really no downside here for the 49ers. The team basically only has to pay him if he produces in 2018 and if he does that, they'll have no problem writing him a huge check every week.

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