Though Eagles running back Brian Westbrook now has a new contract that reportedly will pay him $21 million over the next three years, a league source tells us that the same amount of money was available before Westbrook switched from agent Fletcher Smith to agent Todd France.

The delay in doing the deal arose from the fact that Westbrook’s contract had been renegotiated in March.  Since the CBA permits only one renegotiation per year, the Eagles and Westbrook had to find a way to do the contract in a manner that didn’t raise the cumulative cap number of $14.9 million over the three years for which Westbrook already had been signed.

Beyond that, the details of how the two sides made it happen are unclear.  Guaranteed money apparently was used to get Westbrook to $21 million over three seasons, with cap charges above $14.9 million then being pushed to years four and beyond.

As far as we can tell, Westbrook simply became impatient with the renegotiation process.  Since he couldn’t change teams, he opted instead to change agents.  In the end, he’s in the same place he would have been if he hadn’t made the switch.