It’s now clear the Jaguars regret the decision to exercise the fifth-year option on quarterback Blake Bortles. Which of course makes the original decision even more curious than it was at the time they extended his rookie deal.

It was ultimately a $4 million gamble for the Jaguars. If they didn’t extend the option and if he had played well, it would have cost $23 million to keep him off the market in 2018 via the franchise tag. So they opted instead to give him a $19 million salary in 2018,

It would have been a prudent gamble but for the injury guarantee. With Bortles on the brink of losing the job to Chad Henne, the smart move for the Jaguars would be to keep him off the field completely, the same way Washington did in 2015 with Robert Griffin III. Which means that they’ll pay Bortles $3.4 million to sit, in order to avoid paying him $19 million in the event he suffers an injury that keeps him from passing a physical before the amount becomes fully guaranteed in March.

The Jaguars also could cut Bortles, avoiding the chance of owing him $19 million in 2018. (They won’t escape any of the 2017 base salary, however, because they’re one of the few teams that remove offset language from top-10 deals.) Some have suggested that the Jaguars will try to trade Bortles, but no one will be taking on that contract, unless at a bare minimum Bortles agrees to void the fifth year. His better move would be to refuse to change his deal at all, which would make him a free agent after no team claims his contract in its current form on waivers.

We’ll know for sure that it’s heading this way if the next leak or announcement from Jacksonville is that Bortles won’t play at all in the third preseason game. (The current plan is that he’ll play.) Regardless of whether he’s on the field on Thursday night, the only question left seems to be whether he gets cut or watches every game from the sideline.