Telesco: “I don’t know” if Bosa deal gets done before camp

It still remains unknown when San Diego Chargers first-round pick, Joey Bosa, will join the team after signing his contract. As with any rookie, the organization would likely prefer to have him under contract before the start of training camp, but when asked about the prospects of said deal getting done before that time, Chargers general manager Tom Telesco could only offer the response, “I don’t know”, reports Eric D. Williams of ESPN.com after Telesco appeared on the Mighty 1090 AM radio station in San Diego.

Bosa is one of three first-round picks who have yet to sign their rookie deals, and he is missing valuable time with his new team as a result. Offset language in the deal and deferred bonus money are reportedly the reasons for a holdup in the deal, but it doesn’t appear Telesco is going to budge on those items.

“It really just comes down to generally this-here’s some things that are negotiable, and money always is negotiable, obviously-but there’s certain things in contracts language-wise, whether you’re picked third, 33rd or 203rd, there’s certain things of consistency and doing things the same way for everyone on the team. And we’re far from uncommon with how we work. I know a lot of other teams probably operate the same way. We try to keep some things constant in everyone’s contract, whether you’re Philip Rivers or the 85th guy on the football team. So that’s kind of where we are. We’re still working through it.”

After missing two games of activities during the team’s minicamp in June, Bosa is now looking at the possibility of missing more work with the team, which opens training camp this Saturday. That’s not how the organization envisioned Bosa’s career starting, and the sooner a deal is reached, the better for all involved.

Still, Telesco didn’t sound overly optimistic about a deal getting done.

“I guess we’ll see. I really don’t know if he’ll [show up]. We’re still working on it. Hopefully we’ll get something done, but I don’t know.”

The contract negotiations with Bosa and his holdout seemed to start innocently enough, but now that it’s heading into camp, things could turn ugly in a hurry. How do you feel about Bosa’s decision to refrain from signing to this point? Let us know in the comments section below.