Going all in

[Galian Beast]

Yes, it is when it's the base salary that is guaranteed.

Please see the Tebow trade.

 

[dallasdave]

Next year is the year for the Cowboys to go all in on.

I mentioned it before, but this is a good opportunity for Romo and Witten to take pay cuts. Again, not as a punishment, but as a way of pushing this team across the finish line and getting their names placed in history. They don't have to, but they should, if they want this team to win. Outside of that they should both be restructured.

You also want to restructure Smith, make Carr a June 1st cut, and don't pick up the option on Melton. You don't pick up the option on Free. Though I do think you may want to revisit both of those players in free agency.

Assuming you restructure Romo whether he takes a pay cut or not this would take us to 49 million dollars of cap space (assuming the cap is 143 million) for 2015. 8 million of that would be unavailable until after June.

You cut Dekoda Watson, Terrell McClain, Josh Brent, and you can bring that number to 52 million under the cap.

These moves aren't designed in order for us to super aggressive in free agency, rather they are designed to give us as much flexibility as we would need.

I would look at re-signing Doug Free to two years 7 million dollars.

I would offer Melton a similar deal to what he had this year, though with a smaller signing bonus, given the dead money of the failure of the first contract.

Henry Melton's cap hit for 2014 was actually only 2.359 million dollars, and the dead money we're looking at is only 750k. I think people are giving up on him too quickly, when a manageable deal can be made, especially a second year away from that ACL.

I think you have to resign Dez, which let's say for the sake of argument is 14 million per year. We give him 14 million per year, but we probably back load that so that we don't take much of a hit in 2015 and slightly more in 2016. His 2015 contract can still be pretty negligible depending on his signing bonus. I'll go more into detail on Dez's contract separately.

I don't think we'll have any trouble bringing players back who we want to bring back. It'll be about market value vs team value, I don't think the cap is much of a factor.

You basically have between 30 and 40 million (more or less depending on the cap size) dollars to maintain and upgrade the defense.

That should be good enough with guys like Lee coming back.

Thinking outside the box, I would actually approach Denver and see if they are interested in swapping 7th round draft picks to get Ware off their books. We could agree to pay some of his guaranteed money, and he would become a very nice rotational player for us. Certainly an upgrade from Spencer. Let's say between 3 and 5 million dollars.

You get Ware for super cheap and he is exclusively a 3rd down rusher, and we get one of our fan favorite players back for a super bowl run like he should have always been. You also get another defensive end in free agency and the draft.

You then have Ware, Lawrence, Free Agent DE, and Mincey.... not a bad deal in my opinion.

Ware, Lawrence, Free Agent DE, and Mincey-Now that sounds like a pass rush to me

 

[cowboys1981]

Ware didn't want less money last offseason and I doubt he will take a pay cut this season. I'd rather use the money on SDE Pernell McPhee so he can stand opposite of Lawrence. With an added offseason Lawrence will add to his sack total.

Lawrence-McPhee-Mincey would be a good start to helping the pass rush prior to the draft.

 

[burmafrd]

I AM willing to go along with some risk - Romo has 2-3 years left max and who knows how long until we get a QB of that quality again.

The Cap fantasy types must remember that the cap will not be set until after all the expenses off the top are taken out; which is why you will not know until March and why most of the speculation now is worthless on the final cap number. Last year all the so called specialists were wrong. All the lawsuits, pension and health benefit costs have to be refigured each year so that is why there is no final number now. $140 m is a good one to use as the limit for this year. Any more is for the happy fans

 

[black label]

Romo and Witten are not taking pay cuts, Romo and Smith will restructure each year per their contract. I expect Josh Brent back for training camp. Highly unlikely we pick up Demarcus Ware who is signed with Denver and was a ghost the last six weeks.

 

[irishline]

Please see the Tebow trade.

When the Seahawks traded Harvin to the Jets this year the prorated portion of the 11 million guaranteed salary that was left in his contract became the Jets responsibility and the Seahawks saved over 6.5 million in the deal. Yes you are responsible for guaranteed base salary you take on in a trade... just not guaranteed bonus paid as part of the contract...

http://www.nationalfootballpost.com/The-salary-cap-implications-of-the-Percy-Harvin-trade.html

"Seattle’s salary cap charge for Harvin this year drops from $13.4 million to $6,929,412 ($4,529,412 in base salary and $2.4 million in signing bonus proration) since they are no longer responsible for Harvin’s fully guaranteed $11 million salary for the remaining 10 weeks of the regular season... Harvin’s $6,470,588 salary (10/17th of $11 million) for the rest of the season was easily absorbed because the Jets had the NFL’s second-most cap room"

Tim Tebow was different as it was a salary advance. This is treated the same as bonus not as guaranteed base salary. Payton Manning did the same thing for Denver for last year (the last link explains how his salary advance was calculated according to the cap).

http://espn.go.com/new-york/nfl/sto...-broncos-complete-tim-tebow-trade-second-time

http://www.nfl.com/news/story/0ap10...-gain-25m-in-13-cap-space-in-manning-contract

 

[DBOY3141]

Ware, Lawrence, Free Agent DE, and Mincey-Now that sounds like a pass rush to me

No to Ware for me. He's been done for a few years now.

 

[xwalker]

Please see the Tebow trade.

Link?

 

[Galian Beast]

When the Seahawks traded Harvin to the Jets this year the prorated portion of the 11 million guaranteed salary that was left in his contract became the Jets responsibility and the Seahawks saved over 6.5 million in the deal. Yes you are responsible for guaranteed base salary you take on in a trade... just not guaranteed bonus paid as part of the contract...

http://www.nationalfootballpost.com/The-salary-cap-implications-of-the-Percy-Harvin-trade.html

"Seattle’s salary cap charge for Harvin this year drops from $13.4 million to $6,929,412 ($4,529,412 in base salary and $2.4 million in signing bonus proration) since they are no longer responsible for Harvin’s fully guaranteed $11 million salary for the remaining 10 weeks of the regular season... Harvin’s $6,470,588 salary (10/17th of $11 million) for the rest of the season was easily absorbed because the Jets had the NFL’s second-most cap room"

Tim Tebow was different as it was a salary advance. This is treated the same as bonus not as guaranteed base salary. Payton Manning did the same thing for Denver for last year (the last link explains how his salary advance was calculated according to the cap).

http://espn.go.com/new-york/nfl/sto...-broncos-complete-tim-tebow-trade-second-time

http://www.nfl.com/news/story/0ap10...-gain-25m-in-13-cap-space-in-manning-contract

http://espn.go.com/new-york/nfl/sto...-broncos-complete-tim-tebow-trade-second-time

As I said, you can negotiate who pays the salary.

 

[Galian Beast]

Link?

http://espn.go.com/new-york/nfl/sto...-broncos-complete-tim-tebow-trade-second-time

 

[DeaconMoss]

we'll be able to re-sign him at a bargain price. He wants to be here and other teams won't take the risk. He won't get offered anything big by anyone. Im thinking 2 years 6 million.

Im all for that. Good starter and depth guy that has shown he can play at a high level.

 

[ABQCOWBOY]

http://espn.go.com/new-york/nfl/sto...-broncos-complete-tim-tebow-trade-second-time

As I said, you can negotiate who pays the salary.

Where did you say that it could be negotiated?

 

[Galian Beast]

Where did you say that it could be negotiated?

Try the OP...

 

[irishline]

http://espn.go.com/new-york/nfl/sto...-broncos-complete-tim-tebow-trade-second-time

That is a salary advance. Not guaranteed salary or a bonus. I told you how it was accounted for, not that they were 1 in the same. Provide a link where a guaranteed salary was negotiated. Ware's salary is guaranteed, not an advance (they are two different things). I'll answer that for you, zero guaranteed salaries have been negotiated between two teams in a trade... ever.

The negotiation in Tebow that you saw was the payback of money already physically paid by Denver before the trade on future salary, and had nothing to do with the salary cap or its implications.

 

[ABQCOWBOY]

Try the OP...

I'm sorry. Can you post the language that refers to that?

 

[DeaconMoss]

Speaking of all these signings and stuff. It might be real smart money spent to tack on a couple years to Fred Beard and Martin. Maybe save us some money later.

 

[Galian Beast]

That is a salary advance. Not guaranteed salary or a bonus. I told you how it was accounted for, not that they were 1 in the same. Provide a link where a guaranteed salary was negotiated. Ware's salary is guaranteed, not an advance (they are two different things), and what your discussion with Xwalker was about in the first place.

Please cite me an nfl rule where it says you can negotiate a portion of an advance but not a guaranteed salary...

 

[Galian Beast]

I'm sorry. Can you post the language that refers to that?

No, I'll let you read it.

 

[ABQCOWBOY]

No, I'll let you read it.

I did read it. That is why I'm confused. If you simply post the language you are referring to in the OP, that would help a lot.

 

[Galian Beast]

I did read it. That is why I'm confused. If you simply post the language you are referring to in the OP, that would help a lot.

"Thinking outside the box, I would actually approach Denver and see if they are interested in swapping 7th round draft picks to get Ware off their books. We could agree to pay some of his guaranteed money, and he would become a very nice rotational player for us. Certainly an upgrade from Spencer. Let's say between 3 and 5 million dollars."