Kansas City Chiefs safety Jarrad Page has reportedly signed his free agent tender. This now means, if the report is accurate, he is officially part of the Chiefs roster.
What Page has done by not signing his tender until now is save over $500,000 in fines he would have incurred by skipping training camp. Of course he wasn't under contract so he couldn't be fined.
His tender amount was $1.759 million but the Chiefs had the option of reducing it another $64,000 back in July. We're not sure if they ever did that.
All that said, here are the Chiefs options at this point.
They can place him on the roster exempt list. This is the option that I think has a good shot of happening because it can buy the Chiefs time.
Here's the relevant portion of the CBA that talks about it.
If the player has not reported at least the day before the Club’s fourth pre-season game, he may be placed on roster exempt until the day following the third regular season game scheduled after the date he actually reports.
Basically, he wouldn't count against the roster and, if I can read the CBA correctly, he wouldn't be paid (I actually can't confirm he wouldn't be paid). The big thing though is he wouldn't count against the roster. That's really the only way Page can force the Chiefs hand.
They can keep him. This option this highly unlikely considering everything that has transpired. Page's reps publicly called the Chiefs "vindictive" while asking for a trade. Plus, he clearly doesn't have a future with the Chiefs at safety.
They can release him. Again, this options doesn't seem that likely considering the Chiefs have dug their heels in to this point. If this were an option, you gotta think they wouldn't have tendered him in the first place.
They can trade him. Now that he has signed his tender, he can be traded. This would appear to be an option since keeping him and releasing him don't seem like options. He couldn't be traded until he signed the tender.
They can place him on PUP. I'm not sure how likely this is but I suppose he could "fail" a conditioning test -- or if he's not in shape -- and the Chiefs could put him on the physically unable to perform list to start the season. Remember, he's coming off of a season-ending injury.