When I saw the ESPN headline, 'Smith, 49ers agree on $45 million contract,' my immediate thought was "Good God! They gave Alex Smith a huge extension? What the hell are they smoking!?"

The original headline on ESPN was "49ers sign Smith to 6 year, $45MM deal".

You can imagine my panic and confusion.

Dammit. Timing is everything.

alex smith did sign an extension, by the by... just not of this magnitude.

All signs point to Justin Smith playing OLB for the 49ers....which is crazy enough giving him this big deal to play a position he never played in the NFL.

5: I really think that Smith will play defensive end for the niners. They'll get him to bulk up 10 - 15 lbs so he'll be up around 290. I expect him to be good against the run and the pass but I would have liked the niners to have landed him for $5 million less. That's the free agent market for you (I also expect that the final year of the deal will never be played and that the compensation will be more like $7m per annum).

For example, Marques Douglas is now listed at around 295 on the 49ers website, up from 280 when we signed him.

So no tampering there then....

I wouldn't say all signs point to him being an OLB. ESPN is suggesting the 49ers will make him a DE to replace Bryant Young.

4#

It wasn't an extension. It was the team exercising the buyback clause on his rookie contract. There is a difference. If they decline his buyback, they can't seriously allow him to be on the roster and compete for a starting job in 2008, because if for some reason he should do well, he'd bolt to another team in free agency.

8#

No more tampering than what allowed the Dolphins to sign Justin Smiley within a half hour of free agency beginning. Jerry Angelo had some serious stones to file charges considering some of the free agents he's signed suspiciously early.

Regarding Justin Smith: he'll be playing DE; DL was such a need position for this team that he definitely wasn't signed as an OLB. Now, if Roosevelt Colvin is healthy....

10:

I wasn't particualry singling out the Niners. Just about every first day free agent signing is a little suspect.

But for the last couple of weeks on PFT.com they've been saying the Smith signing is all but 100% done.

I think Smith could be a pretty ideal 3-4 DE. He doesn't provide enough outside pass rush for a 4-3 (at least not a Tampa-2 style 4-3), but he seems to hold the point of attack pretty well.

Yeah, the Alex Smith buyback just allows the 49ers to cut Smith after this year if needed and spread the bonus over a few seasons as opposed to one lump sum. It's as much for financial reasons than any vote of confidence.