I was out doing “real” work this morning when MDS posted the blurb about the Fins giving Jake Long a deadline for working out a deal to become the No. 1 overall pick, so I haven’t had a chance to chime in regarding the latest disclosure regarding the team’s tactics.

So I will now.

It’s classic Bill Parcells.  

His goal, Peter King believes, is to pay the top pick less money than what the No. 1 pick received in 2007.  Only Parcells has the personality to pull this off.  And pull it off Parcells will, if the player who ultimately agrees to terms gets good advice based on the best interests of the player, not on the self-interests of his agent.

I wrote about the Parcells’ draft-pick dynamic on Friday for SportingNews.com, but that’s not gonna stop me from addressing it in further detail here.

The analysis is simple.  Assuming that he has no preference in teams among the top five who select (Miami, St. Louis, Atlanta, Oakland, Kansas City), it’s a dollars-and-cents decision for Jake Long.  The issue comes down to how much he’d get in Miami as the No. 1 pick, versus how much he’d get if he isn’t the No. 1 pick.

Gauging that amount can be tricky.  Since we’re fairly certain that the Chiefs would pounce on Long if he’s on the board at No. 5, an armchair expert in probability analysis could quickly throw together a formula that would put a dollar value not accepting the Dolphins’ best offer, based on the realistic possibility of getting picked in each spot from No. 2 to No. 5 and the expected contract that each slot will pay.

Under such an analysis, the answer surely would be to take the offer at No. 1.

The only cause for pause would arise if Long were 100 percent certain that he’d otherwise be the No. 2 selection.  In that case, he’d need to ask himself whether he thinks he’ll get more money at No. 2 than he’ll get at No. 1. 

Complicating matters is the reality that there’s an inherent, but non-specific, marketing value in being the No. 1 overall pick.  Also, what Jake Long gets at No. 2 will be influenced heavily by what the Dolphins pay to someone else at No. 1.  If one of the other high-end prospects eventually accepts the offer that Jake Long rejects, the ceiling will arguably be established for Jake Long at No. 2.

And Jake Long needs to analyze these tough questions with the input of an agent who would be vilified, excoriated, and otherwise dissed by his colleagues in the agent industry if the agent does a deal that actually reduces the astronomical growth in the No. 1 overall contract.  From 2003 to 2007, the guaranteed money shot from $15 million to $32 million.  The concept of heading in the other direction is something that agents simply aren’t wired to comprehend.

If Long doesn’t take the deal from Miami and lands at No. 5, it won’t be difficult for him to count the difference in real dollars that he sacrificed, possibly so that his agent will then be able to recruit another top-five pick in 2009, 2010, and beyond. 

As a league source told me last week, if/when Parcells pulls this off, the first demand from the union in the next CBA will be to prohibit pre-draft negotiations.  And that demand will come from the agents who don’t want to be put in the awkward position of serving their clients, and serving themselves.

Maybe this hasn’t happened sooner because the organizations that have held the No. 1 overall pick in the draft were in that position for a reason.  This year, the worst team from the prior season cleaned house and brought in a new sheriff who’s willing to take on a fight that, over the past several years, none of the teams at the top of the draft board have had the smarts, the nerve, or the will to wage.

Parcells has it all.  And, in this specific context, we love it.