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NFL free agency kicks off with the negotiation period on Saturday, and players can begin signing with new teams Tuesday afternoon. In the meantime, players are free to sign new deals with their current teams. All of this means we will spend the next few weeks interpreting every piece of information in hopes of figuring out what exactly is going on with a given player.
Wednesday morning, San Francisco 49ers cornerback Chris Culliver posted something on Instagram that had folks talking. He posted this with the caption, "Happy Cully":
Culliver is due to hit free agency, and there has been talk he will have a sizable market next week. If the rumors are true, there is little value for him signing a deal in advance. His agent likely has spoken with other teams about his services, even if in general terms. Tampering is illegal, but plenty of teams do it when it comes to free agency. Cully's agent probably has at least a decent idea of what kind of money might be out there.
As I told a couple people, I'm pretty sure this picture is just about the given play he made, and it made him happy. I could very well be wrong, but that strikes me as the most logical possibility.
This will not be the last time I field questions about a player's social media posts. Often times, a player will something that sounds negative, and the first question everybody has is, "What happened with the 49ers?" Even if the player is not talking about football (insert LaMichael James joke), it is the first thing 49ers fans (and other teams' fans) think of on social media.
The next week or two will be plenty busy trying to figure out "WHAT DOES IT ALL MEAN?!?!" when we see a random tweet or Instagram post.