Don't worry about the salary cap

[FuzzyLumpkins]

Originally Posted by Zordon

Would you prefer Free be on the team in 2013?

If he takes a pay cut to no more than $3m AAV and is willing to compete for a starting position I would be fine with it. As it is now I hate the idea.

[Hoofbite]

Originally Posted by Zordon

$9M isn't chump change. It would have been $5.5M but the restructure bumped it up nearly $3M. Restructuring deals makes fans feel good in the short term but if the player needs to be cut in the future (like Free) then that increase in the prorated signing bonus comes back to bite us.

Yeah hopefully we get more clarity on these numbers the next few weeks. Would you prefer Free be on the team in 2013?

I'm not sure it was bumped up 3M.

From Spotrac, he only restructured a total of 4.8M

It looks like they added 2 more years when they restructured it but I dunno. It looks weird and Spotrac doesn't have all the info to figure out what happened.

4 years 32M was the original. Supposedly 10.4M in signing bonus but a total of 17M guaranteed.

Now he's signed through 2016.

I think Spotrac does well with the initial stuff but once restructuring occurs they look to be out of the loop or at the very least don't post all the information necessary to understand what they have posted.

[FuzzyLumpkins]

Originally Posted by Hoofbite

One thing I wanted to mention above but the post got long was the idea of cap "savings". I dunno why but the word "save" just kind of seems a little less appropriate than say, "avoidance".

He must be replaced by someone and presumably if they're wanting the type of play that they expected for him they're going to have to pay for it.

In Free's case, you could probably get equal play from Parnell and just draft a guy to be the backup so I suppose the term "save" is probably as accurate as it gets.

But more generally the term "save" seems a little less applicable. There's threads every year, "how much do we save but cutting...[insert name]" and many times while the player may be underperforming the cost of getting an equal player for a contract more reflective of play would result in additional cap charges when combined with the cut player's accelerated money.

[View Full Quote]I dunno, just kind of one of those things you see and cringe a little. Pet peeve, I guess. Like I said, Free's play was so poor that the team could probably just cut him and go with what they've got and not really have to worry about replacing his production.

I understand why we say it. I've said it numerous times before because it's simple and represents the gist of the effect but as I have sort of navigated into cap waters over the last couple seasons, I've kind of started to view it as more of an "avoidance" of cap charges and there are certainly times when it wouldn't be "saving" at all but just the opposite.

Just a random thought. Not really meant to single you out so I hope you don't take offense to it.

Actually something I was thinking about with Austin's contract. Cap number of 8.3M and bonus money of 4.5 left to account for. I have zero doubt that someone will ask what it might "save" to cut him at some point during the offseason and this would be a scenario where you just won't get an equal player for the difference. Probably won't even come close. Like Miles or not (I personally am a little annoyed with right now but there's no way you cut the guy when he can produce at a level well above his cap figure for the next 3 seasons.), you aren't getting equal play for a cap figure of 4M unless you backload that contract, which is something I've recently become more opposed to. If 4M in cap charges won't get you Laurent Robinson last offseason, it sure isn't getting you Miles Austin this year.

I get what you are saying. In the end you have to pay the piper at some point. If Sportrac is right and that is a big if then we don't have much in terms of dead money next year. Leonard Davis was two years ago and Marion Barber and Terrence Newman counted last year but if you remember the guys we cut were not June 1 designations. We just ate the prorations. Their cap hits are gone.

There are guys we cut this year like McGee and the rookies but its not all that much ie $40k here and there. But we have surprisingly little dead money to begin with. Not like a few years ago where it was $10s of millions.

Eating the prorations last year was huge. We just have a lot guys that had big AAV this year. It really seems to me if I am at all accurate that they prepared for this year and we will be fine if not big players.

Its all based on sportrac and napkin math but that is my take.

[bkight13]

Originally Posted by supercowboy8

releasing Doug Free will not be a 7 million cap savings.
If we release Doug Free then his signing bonus prorated out will all be a cap hit this year. SO if we release Free he will be a 6.018 million cap hit and only a 3 million cap savings.

Sorry I left out the part where he is designated a post June 1st cut to split the remaining $8M signing bonus over 2 years. It will save the Boys $7M in actual salary and cap space.

I have no problem moving some dead money ahead to future years. The cap will go up after next year, the $5M penalty will be gone and we only have Newmans $2M in dead money on this year's books. A couple years ago we were $20M in dead money and that should be avoided.

[FuzzyLumpkins]

Originally Posted by bkight13

Sorry I left out the part where he is designated a post June 1st cut to split the remaining $8M signing bonus over 2 years. It will save the Boys $7M in actual salary and cap space.

I have no problem moving some dead money ahead to future years. The cap will go up after next year, the $5M penalty will be gone and we only have Newmans $2M in dead money on this year's books. A couple years ago we were $20M in dead money and that should be avoided.

Was Newman a June 1 cut? I thought they just ate it. I looked and didn't see that he was.

[bkight13]

Originally Posted by FuzzyLumpkins

We were in great shape before we got Mara'ed. We always said that about the Redskins too.

It's a double hit because we could've rolled that extra $5m from 2012 to 2013 as well, if we didn't use it to find a bettter OG. It's actually more like a $10M hit for 2013. Either way, we are fine for 2013.

[bkight13]

Originally Posted by FuzzyLumpkins

Was Newman a June 1 cut? I thought they just ate it. I looked and didn't see that he was.

Not sure, but his $2M was the only one I saw on the books for 2013. I forget where I saw it.

[Zordon]

Originally Posted by Hoofbite

I'm not sure it was bumped up 3M.

From Spotrac, he only restructured a total of 4.8M

It looks like they added 2 more years when they restructured it but I dunno. It looks weird and Spotrac doesn't have all the info to figure out what happened.

4 years 32M was the original. Supposedly 10.4M in signing bonus but a total of 17M guaranteed.

Now he's signed through 2016.

I think Spotrac does well with the initial stuff but once restructuring occurs they look to be out of the loop or at the very least don't post all the information necessary to understand what they have posted.

When they restructured his contract last season they converted 4.8M of his 2012 base salary into another signing bonus prorated over 3 years. 3.2M of that signing bonus remains plus 5.15M remaining from the original signing bonus. That's why his cost to cut him is 8.35M (5.15M+3.2M).

We can either designate him as a June 1st cut and split that 8.35M cap hit over two years or we can eat all in one year (highly unlikely given Jerry's aggressiveness in FA).

Originally Posted by FuzzyLumpkins

Was Newman a June 1 cut? I thought they just ate it. I looked and didn't see that he was.

Yeah Newman was a June 1st cut. We'll have a 2M cap hit for him in 2013.

[FuzzyLumpkins]

Originally Posted by Zordon

When they restructured his contract last season they converted 4.8M of his 2012 base salary into another signing bonus prorated over 3 years. 3.2M of that signing bonus remains plus 5.15M remaining from the original signing bonus. That's why his cost to cut him is 8.35M (5.15M+3.2M).

We can either designate him as a June 1st cut and split that 8.35M cap hit over two years or we can eat all in one year (highly unlikely given Jerry's aggressiveness in FA).


Yeah Newman was a June 1st cut. We'll have a 2M cap hit for him in 2013.

Is that how it works or is it that you still leave the proration for the previous league year and the accelerated amount is left for the following year.

If the latter is the case then because he $8.35m left over 4 years he only costs about $2m of proration this year and the remaining $6m goes to next. This jives with sportrac but they are often wrong.

[Zordon]

Originally Posted by FuzzyLumpkins

Is that how it works or is it that you still leave the proration for the previous league year and the accelerated amount is left for the following year.

If the latter is the case then because he $8.35m left over 4 years he only costs about $2m of proration this year and the remaining $6m goes to next. This jives with sportrac but they are often wrong.

I could be wrong but I believe the prorated amounts for both signing bonuses are included on this year's ledger. Sportrac shows a 2013 cap hit of 9.06M for Free, this is not updated to show the 1.6M signing bonus amount from the restructure last season.

[Sandyf]

Very interesting discussion on the salary cap but a few things should be cleared up. Romo's contract will not be restructured as 2013 is the last year of his contract. He is scheduled to be a free agent in 2014 and his cap hit for 2013 is actually $16 million.

Now saying that, we will most likely extend Romo for 4 or 5 years which will lessen the cap hit for 2013 by some $4 million to $8 million. Carr's contract was done in such a way that it was scheduled to be restructured in 2013 with most likely a $4 million to $6 million savings.

Austin's really doesn't make sense to restructure since most of his bonus was up front during the supposed uncap year. We would save $5 million against the cap if we cut him though.

Ratliff's contract probably will not be rescheduled since his cap number will only be $6.5 million in 2013.

Free will probably be released although the cap hit would spread over two years that way it would probably save us a little off the cap in 2013.

Other candidates that could be released are Nate Livings and Mackenzy Bernadeau.

The salary cap is scheduled to increase by only $1 million although the NFLPA is negotiating for a larger cap by allowing the HGH testing to go though easier so things could change although I see it as only a slim chance.

We also have to account for the $5 million hit to the cap due to the Mara penalty so reality is that we are roughly $23 million over the cap. Again this could change since the lawsuit by the NFLPA against the NFL for collusion during the uncapped season has not been dropped yet waiting for the federal judge to make a ruling. Again another area probably being negotiated to drop the suit by increasing the cap and possibly reinstating the money back to Dallas and Washington. A fun off season to see yet to come.

I am sure AdamJT will have a much better explanation on every player and the team's actual amount to spend.

[LittleD]

Originally Posted by MichaelWinicki

Not gonna happen.



But they will restructure his contract.

I think Romo might want to explore free agency and moving to other pastures. I think he's pretty tired of the Dallas fishbowl. He can stand pat and just say, I'm playing for 17mil next year or you can cut me. He holds all the leverage now and frankly, I'll be surprised if he's not thinking it's time to go someplace where he might get a little luv for a change.