Dak is not going to sign a 5 year deal with a 35m average regardless of the guarantee and only take an average of 26m per season the 1st 4 years it's too low any agent that would leave that much money on the table isn't a good agent. We all know that non guaranteed money is backloaded on to later years of a contract to make the average look higher but what you are saying is that in the 5th year of a 5 year deal he would sign, his salary would be 68m in the 5th year if he gets 107m over the 1st 4 years..it just won't happen like that, maybe 48m (and even that is high) but not 68 and that extra 20 would have to be paid and spread out over the 1st 4 years. None of this changes what you are saying except that his cap hit for the 1st 4 years is going to be higher each year then you are predicting it would be. After the guarantee is paid they can cut him without a cap hit except for the pro-rated portion of any signing bonus he receives
Contracts are usually set up to be cleared off or renegotiated when the guaranteed money runs out or gets lower than the nonguaranteed money.
Seattle, for instance, can get out of Wilson's deal in 2022. The Seahawks would absorb $26 million in dead cap, but save $11 million in cap space. At that point, Wilson will never have had a year where his salary reached his APY of $35 million. He will have gotten $26.2 in this first year, $31 in his second and $32 in his third. The difference is, and here's where it pays off for the player, is he still receives the rest of his guaranteed money, so he'd receive that $26 million not to play, which means that he would make a total of $115 million over three years played (four years total), which would make his APY actually be $38.4 million if you just consider the years played.
For cap purposes, all that matters is how much they get yearly. For the player, what matters is the guarantee because they are going to get paid even if they get cut. If Dak signs a five-year deal with $107 million guaranteed, then he'll get that $107 and maybe a little nonguaranteed money whether or not he plays a fifth season here (again that's $26.75 per year). Now, as I mentioned in another post, I don't think he'll settle for $107 million on a five-year deal either; I think it will be more like $120 guaranteed.
