I keep hearing fans complaining about the salary cap space and why we aren’t spending it.
Feel free to make conjectures on any scenario, including owner greed.
Personally, I’d love to think Jerry is holding that money either for the 2023 rollover to make a big move after seeing what we need to add to this season’s team, or maybe he’s hedging his bet that our wr group will be fine. Just as he brought in Cooper via trade when it was clear our WRs were subpar, if Ceedee and company aren’t getting the job done, maybe Jerry signs free agent Odell Beckham Jr around mid-October. OBJ is supposed to be ready in October sometime. His speed and ability to improvise when the play breaks down and the QB scrambles would fit our offense well, in my opinion.
What other moves could be made in-season with that money if the Cowboys struggle in a particular area?
"Heading into the 2021 season, the Dallas Cowboys, the richest franchise in the league, are leading the NFL in terms of player salary with $205 million."
- Link at the bottom of this post.
On average over multiple seasons, the Cowboys tend to spend the most.
The 2022 cap space is somewhat of an illusion.
- A 'pay as you go' approach would mean that a player's cap hit each year is equal to their contract average per year.
- If their cap hit is less than their average, then the difference is pushed into future years cap.
The have extra cap space in 2022 because multiple contracts have a significant portion of overall cap hit pushed into future years.
- Dak's average is $40 million.
- His cap hit in 2022 is approximately $20 million.
- That means that $20 million of the 2022 cap hit is pushed into future years.
- They also pushed about $23 million of his contract into future years.
On average, teams can't save much in real dollars by not spending under the cap.
- There is a cap minimum based on a 5 year running average.
- i.e. You won't see a team under the cap for 5 consecutive seasons.
https://sports.betmgm.com/en/blog/nfl-teams-highest-payroll-2021-bm05/