Salary guarantee is real welcome relief for stricken Udeze

The Vikings defensive end caught a big break by being placed on the non-football illness list with pay.

By JUDD ZULGAD, Star Tribune

Last update: July 2, 2008 - 12:33 AM

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The Vikings' decision to place defensive end Kenechi Udeze on the reserve/nonfootball illness (NFI) list will result in his contract running through 2009 instead of 2008.

Udeze, who was diagnosed with an acute form of leukemia in February and will undergo a bone marrow transplant early this month, was put on NFI this spring and will sit out the season.

Under terms of the NFL's Collective Bargaining Agreement, "a player on NFI who is the final year of his contract will have his contract tolled."

In other words, it stops for that season. Udeze should have been entering the final season of the five-year agreement he signed in 2004 after the Vikings selected him in the first round of the draft.

"Isn't that crazy?" Udeze said. "It will be good because you can work up your résumé again, show everybody that you're healthy again."

Although the Vikings are under no obligation to pay Udeze while he's on NFI, the team has said the veteran will receive his base salary of $807,500 for 2008. Udeze has made it clear he plans on being back on the field in 2009 and is thankful to the Vikings for guaranteeing his money.

"I'd say anybody dealing with this, especially in my position being a professional athlete, they want to know where they stand," Udeze said. "I feel like I've been playing at a reasonable level, but I never felt like I've tipped the scales of what I can do. Nobody knows which way the organization is going to pull you or want you in the future or if they've just kind of had enough with you.

"I just told myself with every day that I go out there, everybody sees that I do the best I can. When I found out the news [of the Vikings guaranteeing his salary] I was kind of taken aback by it. Being in the hospital [while he was receiving treatment] I didn't really ask the kind of question like, 'OK, what's going to happen next?'

"When I found out, I was very excited about it because I didn't want to go anywhere. I love being here, I love my teammates, I love the unity that we have."