Joey Bosa is in the building.

At last.

The Chargers signed their No. 3 overall pick Monday morning. He is set to have his first practice with the team Tuesday. Bosa had been absent from the club since June, as the team and his agent worked to settle a contract dispute that largely centered on the payout of his signing bonus.

1 / 11 The Chargers have signed their No. 3 overall pick, Monday morning. Joey Bosa, defensive end for the San Diego Chargers met with reporters at Charger Park late Monday afternoon. (Nelvin C. Cepeda) 2 / 11 The Chargers have signed their No. 3 overall pick, Monday morning. Joey Bosa, defensive end for the San Diego Chargers met with reporters at Charger Park late Monday afternoon. (Nelvin C. Cepeda) 3 / 11 The Chargers have signed their No. 3 overall pick, Monday morning. Joey Bosa, defensive end for the San Diego Chargers met with reporters at Charger Park late Monday afternoon. (Nelvin C. Cepeda) 4 / 11 The Chargers have signed their No. 3 overall pick, Monday morning. Joey Bosa, defensive end for the San Diego Chargers met with reporters at Charger Park late Monday afternoon. (Nelvin C. Cepeda) 5 / 11 The Chargers have signed their No. 3 overall pick, Monday morning. Joey Bosa, defensive end for the San Diego Chargers met with reporters at Charger Park late Monday afternoon. (Nelvin C. Cepeda) 6 / 11 The Chargers have signed their No. 3 overall pick, Monday morning. Joey Bosa, defensive end for the San Diego Chargers met with reporters at Charger Park late Monday afternoon. (Nelvin C. Cepeda) 7 / 11 The Chargers have signed their No. 3 overall pick, Monday morning. Joey Bosa, defensive end for the San Diego Chargers met with reporters at Charger Park late Monday afternoon. (Nelvin C. Cepeda) 8 / 11 The Chargers have signed their No. 3 overall pick, Monday morning. Joey Bosa, defensive end for the San Diego Chargers met with reporters at Charger Park late Monday afternoon. (Nelvin C. Cepeda) 9 / 11 The Chargers have signed their No. 3 overall pick, Monday morning. Joey Bosa, defensive end for the San Diego Chargers met with reporters at Charger Park late Monday afternoon. (Nelvin C. Cepeda) 10 / 11 The Chargers have signed their No. 3 overall pick, Monday morning. Joey Bosa, defensive end for the San Diego Chargers met with reporters at Charger Park late Monday afternoon. (Nelvin C. Cepeda) 11 / 11 The Chargers have signed their No. 3 overall pick, Monday morning. Joey Bosa, defensive end for the San Diego Chargers met with reporters at Charger Park late Monday afternoon. (Nelvin C. Cepeda)


“We came to a fair deal,” Bosa said. “There’s no animosity between any of us, me toward them or them toward me.”

Bosa has a chance now to be on the field Sept. 11 for the season opener at Kansas City. His role, however, could be limited initially as he works himself into football shape. It is possible that Darius Philon will start at left defensive end while Bosa, 21, works in the Chargers’ substitution packages.

The key thing for the Chargers was to get Bosa here first.

A critical development in closing the gap between the two sides was a switch of the agent who led Bosa’s negotiations, sources said. The change came after Chargers President of Football Operations John Spanos went public Wednesday, saying the team had made its best offer and agent Brian Ayrault had turned it down. Spanos vowed the offer would only reduce from there. In the days that followed the hard-line stance, a transfer occurred from Ayrault to Todd France, who also works for CAA and co-represents Bosa. “Good cop, bad cop,” one source called it, referring to CAA’s tactic.


From there, negotiations restarted to some degree.

1 / 19 Joey Bosa defensive end for the San Diego Chargers attended his first practice with the team late Tuesday morning. Yesterday on Monday the Chargers have signed their No. 3 overall pick. (Nelvin C. Cepeda) 2 / 19 Getting a fist bump from Tenny Palepoi, Joey Bosa defensive end for the San Diego Chargers attended his first practice with the team late Tuesday morning. (Nelvin C. Cepeda) 3 / 19 Joey Bosa defensive end for the San Diego Chargers attended his first practice with the team late Tuesday morning. Yesterday on Monday the Chargers have signed their No. 3 overall pick. (Nelvin C. Cepeda) 4 / 19 Joey Bosa defensive end for the San Diego Chargers attended his first practice with the team late Tuesday morning. Yesterday on Monday the Chargers have signed their No. 3 overall pick. (Nelvin C. Cepeda) 5 / 19 Joey Bosa defensive end for the San Diego Chargers attended his first practice with the team late Tuesday morning. Yesterday on Monday the Chargers have signed their No. 3 overall pick. (Nelvin C. Cepeda) 6 / 19 Joey Bosa defensive end for the San Diego Chargers attended his first practice with the team late Tuesday morning. Yesterday on Monday the Chargers have signed their No. 3 overall pick. (Nelvin C. Cepeda) 7 / 19 Joey Bosa defensive end for the San Diego Chargers attended his first practice with the team late Tuesday morning. Yesterday on Monday the Chargers have signed their No. 3 overall pick. (Nelvin C. Cepeda) 8 / 19 Joey Bosa defensive end for the San Diego Chargers attended his first practice with the team late Tuesday morning. Yesterday on Monday the Chargers have signed their No. 3 overall pick. (Nelvin C. Cepeda) 9 / 19 Chargers Tenny Palepoi (95) and Corey Liuget (94)welcome Joey Bosa to practice late Tuesday morning. (Nelvin C. Cepeda) 10 / 19 Chargers along with Joey Bosa pose for news photographers who were photographing Bosa’s first team practice late Tuesday morning. (Nelvin C. Cepeda) 11 / 19 Joey Bosa defensive end for the San Diego Chargers attended his first practice with the team late Tuesday morning. Yesterday on Monday the Chargers have signed their No. 3 overall pick. (Nelvin C. Cepeda) 12 / 19 Joey Bosa defensive end for the San Diego Chargers attended his first practice with the team late Tuesday morning. Yesterday on Monday the Chargers have signed their No. 3 overall pick. (Nelvin C. Cepeda) 13 / 19 Joey Bosa defensive end for the San Diego Chargers attended his first practice with the team late Tuesday morning. Yesterday on Monday the Chargers have signed their No. 3 overall pick. (Nelvin C. Cepeda) 14 / 19 Chargers along with Joey Bosa pose for news photographers who were photographing Bosa’s first team practice late Tuesday morning. (Nelvin C. Cepeda) 15 / 19 Joey Bosa defensive end for the San Diego Chargers attended his first practice with the team late Tuesday morning. (Nelvin C. Cepeda) 16 / 19 Joey Bosa defensive end for the San Diego Chargers attended his first practice with the team late Tuesday morning. Yesterday on Monday the Chargers have signed their No. 3 overall pick. (Nelvin C. Cepeda) 17 / 19 Chargers Tenny Palepoi (95) and Corey Liuget (94)welcome Joey Bosa to practice late Tuesday morning. (Nelvin C. Cepeda) 18 / 19 Joey Bosa defensive end for the San Diego Chargers attended his first practice with the team late Tuesday morning. Yesterday on Monday the Chargers have signed their No. 3 overall pick. (Nelvin C. Cepeda) 19 / 19 Joey Bosa defensive end for the San Diego Chargers attended his first practice with the team late Tuesday morning. Yesterday on Monday the Chargers have signed their No. 3 overall pick. (Nelvin C. Cepeda)

On Sunday morning, before the team kicked off against the Vikings at 10 a.m. PT, the Chargers and France agreed to a deal largely resembling the “best offer” from last week, a deal featuring 85 percent cash payout of Bosa’s $17-million signing bonus, or about $14.45 million, this calendar year, sources said. The rest will be deferred to March. Improved training camp roster-bonus language for Bosa was a notable difference, a source said, from last week’s offer. As long established, Bosa’s contract features offset language.

Neither France nor Ayrault returned a call seeking comment. Spanos declined comment on the agent movement or contract specifics.


“I prefer to keep the details quiet, but I would like to thank Todd France for his professionalism and his help in getting this deal done,” Spanos said.

It was about time.

Bosa admitted Monday he didn’t anticipate it’d take so long for his contract to be completed. His Monday signing came 31 days after he was scheduled to report to training camp July 29 and 84 days since June 7, his last spring practice with the Chargers. It took 123 days total, from the day the team drafted him (April 28) to Monday, for him to be signed.

There is no replicating that missed time, be it practice reps or team bonding. But during it, Bosa insisted, he kept busy.


The defensive end characterized his life as “all business,” not doing much aside from training in Florida. He said he worked out six days a week, taking Sundays off, during the summer break before training camp. He lived with his mother, worked out and received treatment for his body while the rest of the team was at training camp. Come Monday, he passed the eye test when he reported to the facility, teammates said.

Clearly, Bosa hadn’t spent the past month eating Twizzlers and Funyuns on his mom’s couch.

“I didn’t think it was fair to the guys out here if I was enjoying time off, partying, doing this, that or the other while they were working,” Bosa said. “I thought I owed it to them and myself to really give it everything I had. ... I’m in the best shape I’ve ever been in my life.”

There was a time when rookie contract standoffs were a regularity for first-round draft picks, but the 2011 collective bargaining agreement largely rendered them obsolete when it instituted a pay-slot system while standardizing many elements of how a rookie contract could be structured. Bosa’s so-called holdout was the longest under this CBA, and not since Raiders quarterback JaMarcus Russell in 2007 has a top-three pick signed so late; Russell’s holdout ended Sept. 12.


This is a different era in 2016.

Bosa dealt with social-media backlash, be it fan comments toward him and his family on Bosa’s Instagram and Twitter accounts — he wound up deleting both apps off his phone during the dispute, he said — or his mother Cheryl’s Aug. 7 post on her private Facebook account going viral. She wrote to a friend that she wished the family “pulled an Eli Manning” on draft day, impeding the Chargers from drafting her son in the first place.

That was a mother’s frustration.

“What do you expect a mom to do?” Bosa said. “She loves me. She wants what’s best for me, and she made a dumb decision like I have before, saying something I shouldn’t have on social media. She honestly had no idea it was public; she thought she was sending it to someone else. ... She’s happy I’m here, and I would never turn down an opportunity to be in this situation.”


The past month, at times, has been a messy situation. But that’s over now.

At last.

RELATED