•Good afternoon everyone--happy Daylight Savings Day to all.
•We're approximately 2 days away from free agency which starts along with the new 2013 League year at 4 pm ET on Tuesday, March 12th.
•The Giants made 2 moves this past week with respect to the cap: they restructured the contract of David Baas, and they tacked on a voidable year to the contract of Corey Webster, in essence giving him a pay cut and restructuring his deal at the same time.
Listed below are 3 great articles on the subject:
1.
"The difference between the Giants’ dealings with Webster and Baas" by Andrew from overthecap.com **keep in mind this article was written before the rest of Corey Webster's contract details were revealed
2.
"Update on Corey Webster’s Restructure – Giants Tack on Voidable Season" by Andrew from overthecap.com
3.
"The Danger of the Contract Restructure" by Andrew Fitzgerald of overthecap.com
•Listed below are the estimated salary cap figures for all 32 clubs, courtesy of overthecap.com
•Listed below that are the estimated salary cap figures in alphabetical order.
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Cap Space for teams as of March 10, 2013
(Sorted from most cap space to least cap space):
•Source for Carryover $ column:
http://nfltraderumors.co/nfl-team-cap-space-6/
•Source for Cap Spending & Space columns:
http://www.overthecap.com/nfl-cap-space.php?Year=2013
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Cap Space for teams (sorted in alphabetical order): as of March 10, 2013
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•The Giants are 20th out of 32 teams with respect to their salary cap space.
•According to the figures listed above, 3 teams are over the salary cap at this time--
New Orleans, Washington, & Dallas; last week at this time it was 5.
•Mike Garafolo, of USA Today, has his number of teams that are over the salary cap as being 4, not 3. They are as follows:
Dallas, New Orleans, Carolina, & Washington; here is the link:
”Four NFL teams still over the salary cap” by Mike Garafolo, USA TODAY Sports | 3:30p.m. EST March 9, 2013
•The Giants' salary cap number of $10,332,113 will change further because of the money expected to be tendered for the Giants Restricted Free Agents (RFAs):
Cruz, S. Brown, and A. Brown.
•There are 3 possible tenders that a team can offer RFAs (see below):
•The Giants are most likely going to tender them as follows:
•Assuming no other salary cap moves are made--which there most certainly will be more of--this would then make the Giants' actual salary cap number entering free agency to be
$4,107,113 (done by subtracting $6,225,000 from $10,332,113).
•The Giants have until the start of free agency (4 pm ET on Tuesday, March 12th) to tender their RFAs; they have the room to do it under the salary cap as of now, so they will most certainly do it before then, making this academic--the only variable left to consider is the tender amounts, which are expected to be as posted above.
•Keep in mind that the Giants can make more room under the cap by doing with David Diehl what they did with Webster, as far as the voidable year is concerned, thereby making it a paycut/restructure instead of a flat paycut; of course, a paycut is still clearly an option.
•Diehl is in the final year of his deal, and currently has a Cap Number of $6,903,125---that MUST change, one way or the other since his performance and age are no longer commensurate with his Cap Number (see below).
•Source: http://www.overthecap.com/cap.php?Name=David%20Diehl& Position=RT& Team=Giants
•Here's a good article to read about the voidable year that can be added on to contracts like Webster's and Diehl's to follow-up this discussion/sub-topic even further:
"The Voidable Year and the Salary Cap" by Jason Fitzgerald from overthecap.com
•The Giants will still look to other players on the team to restructure before free agency starts--"The Bank of Eli" and Rolle come to mind, along with possibly Chris Snee--in order to create more room under the 2013 salary cap.
•Check out their salary cap numbers here:
New York Giants 2013 Salary Cap (from overthecap.com)
•Remember that Eli's restructure last year was announced on March 8th, so the 12 month rule applies in that case if he were to restructure again.
•Please note: It is possible to restructure multiple times in a single year even if a player "restructures down", meaning that he accepts less money in restructure, as opposed to more in the form of an accelerated bonus.
•This is obviously not the case with Eli, so be on the look out for that because it it's going to happen, expect it to happen sooner rather than later (Chris Snee's restructure last year was done at the beginning of September in case anyone is keeping track).
•Remember these basic rules about restructuring contracts (see the 3rd link at the very top of the article for reference as well):
•The Giants were reported to have been in talks to re-sign 2 more of their own free agents earlier this week, in Martellus Bennett and Kevin Boothe; however, that seems unlikely at this point after reports surfaced indicating that both players are most likely to enter free agency without having agreed to terms with the Giants.
•The Giants will most likely try to re-sign their own players--
with Hixon, Carr, & Blackburn being 3 players they'd like back besides Bennett and Boothe.
•Fortunately for the Giants, they were able to re-sign their top priority in unrestricted free agency this year in Will Beatty, but there's still more work to be done, as mentioned above.
•As far as signing players from other teams is concerned, the Giants will probably opt to go for lower priced players, a la
LBs Daryl Smith from Jacksonville or Thomas Howard from Cincinnati to help the super thin numbers at LB, especially with Kiwi getting increased snaps at DE, or possibly going there exclusively from now on.
•In recent history, as another poster whose handle I can't recall now astutely pointed out, there is no middle ground with the Giants when it comes to free agency: they either hit it running at full speed (as in 2005 and in 2009), or they are bottom feeders, opting to sign bargain-basement types for depth purposes (almost every year other than '05 and '09)--this philosophy has served them well, netting them 2 SB titles in the last 6 seasons.
•Other players that the Giants may target from the outside in case TE M. Bennett leaves are his former teammate with the Cowboys and NJ native,
Anthony Fasano who played for Miami lat year. Fortunately, he can pick up the slack in the blocking department and minimize Bennett's loss, if in fact he does sign elsewhere once free agency is underway.
•Later on this offseason, the Giants will need to set aside money to sign their draft choices, sometime after the draft, preferrably soon after it, beginning in late April.
•As of now, the amount of estimated cap money that they would need to sign all of their picks is
$4,614,587 (see below).
http://www.overthecap.com/rookie-pool-estimate.php
•Here are the
2013 NFL Draft Rookie Contract and Salary Cap pick by pick estimates for the entire draft so far from overthecap.com, if you're interested.
•These numbers are certain to change since compensatory picks have yet to be awarded yet (they typically are announced at the end of March---approximately 2 weeks from today).
•Don't forget that trades are part of the ever-changing equation with respect to these pick by pick estimates as well, so expect that to change things up too.
•Here are the Giants' rookie pool estimates as of now:
http://www.overthecap.com/rookiepool.php?Team=Giants
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March 10, 2013
Cap Spending figures for teams not spending 89% of their cash so far (sorted by most Cap money needed to be spent to least):
•The salary cap has been set at $123 million for the 2013 season.
•89% of $123 million = $109,470,000
•8 teams are not on pace to meet the cap spending limit as of this time—with the Giants being one; last week at this time it was 12.
•By the time free agency starts in a couple of day, it'll be very surprising if anymore than 1 or 2 of the teams listed above haven't met this threshold, even though they don't have to for this year.
•The Cap floor rule is one that has been misunderstood by many heretofore; please scroll down for an explanation regarding it below.
•You may read more about it here as well:
Minimum Salary Floor explanation for the salary cap
She wasn't sure whether the Giants did this with Bradshaw and Canty. Have you seen anything about that and do the numbers you are using reflect the cap hit for the cut players in the 2013 season only? Just curious!!
(My apologies to Pat if I misinterpreted her)
Here's a list of the players that the Giants have acquired via rookie free agency since 2010:
2010 (2) - WR-Cruz & C-Jim Cordle.
2011 (4) - FB-Henyry Hynoski, LB-Mark Herzlich, DE-Justin Trattou, & LB-Spencer Paysinger.
2012 (6) - WR-Brandon Collins, OG-Stephen Goodin, DE-Adewale Ojomo, DE/LB-Matt Broha, DT-Bobby Skinner, & LB-Jake Muasau.
There's also the guys who the Giants acquired as "street free agents" (a.k.a. players found on the scrap heap) last year with good potential: Safeties Stevie Brown (drafted in 2010 by the Raiders in the 7th round out of Michigan) and Will Hill (who should have been drafted in 2011, but wasn't because of concerns about his character).
Terry in CO : 2:53 pm
In a recent article, Pat from Inside Football mentioned that under the new agreement, teams can cut a player before June 1st but take the cap hit as though it was a post June 1st cut - thereby spreading the "dead money" over the following season as well (at least that was my interpretation of what she said).
She wasn't sure whether the Giants did this with Bradshaw and Canty. Have you seen anything about that and do the numbers you are using reflect the cap hit for the cut players in the 2013 season only? Just curious!!
(My apologies to Pat if I misinterpreted her)
The numbers I'm using do in fact reflect the cap hit for the players who were cut so far (Bradshaw, Boley, and Canty) see the Dead money below:
http://www.overthecap.com/teamcap.php?Team=Giants&Year=2013
To answer your question about what you said Pat was talking about spreading the cap hit over two years as if it were like a June 1st cut, I think she was talking about the Voidable year (which Osi had this year, and which I linked above).
Here is the link for the voidable year again:
""The Voidable Year and the Salary Cap" by Jason Fitzgerald from overthecap.com
For a little extra reading, here's a link to an article about June 1st cuts:
"Explaining the June 1st Designation " by Jason Fitzgerald from overthecap.com
Interesting from the last article you linked:
The league allows each team to designate up to two players per year as a June 1 cut for cap purposes prior to June 1. It’s the one concession that was given to the players as it allows a player to be cut in March and have time to explore free agency but have his cap hit spread out over two seasons, thus creating more cap space in the current year.
However the kicker is that:
When you designate someone as a June 1 cut the player and his current contract remain on the books until June 1.
Thanks again.
I guess we'll find out if any of the players that the Giants cut will fit that bill. I think that we'd all like to know before that though, lol.
Link - ( New Window )
1. "NFLPA agreed to Cowboys/Redskins salary cap sanctions" | Posted by Mike Florio on March 12, 2012, 6:56 PM EDT
2. "Redskins, Cowboys salary-cap appeals dismissed" by Jeff Darlington - Reporter, NFL.com and NFL Network | Published: May 22, 2012 at 11:46 a.m. | Updated: July 26, 2012 at 08:15 p.m.
As far as Dallas is concerned, they are a certified mess, and a case study of how NOT to manage the cap. Jerruh has his cap people plays "kick the can" with his players' contracts (he is the GM there and is thus responsible). Foolish management on his part.
San Francisco is beginning to deal with their players coming of age, and as a result, it's time to pay the piper
Here's a list of their UFA players:
OG Leonard Davis
WR/PR Ted Ginn Jr.
FS Dashon Goldson
LB Tavares Gooden
LB Larry Grant
LB Clark Haggans
DL Ricky Jean-Francois
WR Randy Moss
NT Isaac Sopoaga
TE Delanie Walker
http://www.ninersnation.com/2013/2/5/3955110/49ers-free-agents-2013-complete-list-salary-cap
And thanks for listing the 49ers' UFAs. I wonder how many RFAs they have.
(I'm sure a lot of other teams are salivating); plus, they have 15 draft picks this year to pay
•Diehl's numbers are listed above in the table with his contract numbers. If the Giants were to release him right now, the CAP SAVINGS would be $4,825,000 with the DEAD MONEY being $2,078,125.
•Alternatively, they could let Diehl play out the last year of deal, but that wouldn't make any kind of sense considering how steeply his play has declined with respect to his high 2013 CAP NUMBER ($6,903,125).
•Diehl is toast at those numbers listed above. Unless he accepts a lesser deal, he won't be a Giants at all in 2013. Take it to the bank.
10.3 Current Available.
1. - 6.2 RFA tenders (1,2,4)
2. - 3.7 Rookie pool (only 1-5 count towards cap)
3. + 3.6 Diehl. Renegotiate salary from 4.8 to 1.2.
4. + 3.2 8 minimum contracts replaced by 1+2
5. - .6 Net cap hit for 3 vet min(Hixon,Blackburn,+1)
6. - 1.5 Workout bonus + 1mm flex
= 5.1 Cap Space to Work With
Add to that any other restructures think we can get done. The only real possibilities as you mentioned are:
- Eli - would prefer to extend as opposed to restructure but don't see him negotiating now.
- Snee - prefer to renegotiate to drop his current salary; restructuring isn't really an option. Estimated 1-3 mm.
- Rolle - prefer to renegotiate to drop current salary; restructuring isn't really an option. Estimated 1-3 million.
So all in all, we're not in complete cap hell and should have some flex to bring in 1-2 good players (depending on bonus + length).
Also, read where each team has to put aside $540K for their upcoming off-season workout programs, so even though it's not much, that number needs to come out of the available cap space, if it hasn't already.
Good point about the $504,000 being deducted from each team's cap number on account of the accrual of workout bonuses once the 2013 league year starts 2 days from now. I was too lazy to go through it.
Please note that this is a work in progress as we work our way through the current rosters and continue to accrue dead money for various teams. The cap room estimates are based on a salary cap of $123 million and then adjusted for each team based on their reported carryovers from the 2012 League Year. Each teams' cap will be adjusted downward by $504,000 due to the NFL accrual of workout bonuses for each team when the new League Year officially begins so the effective cap room will be reduced by that amount.
Source:NFL Estimated Salary Cap Room courtesy of Jason Fitzgerald from overthecap.com
I'll update the cap numbers again next Sunday once those numbers take effect.
•The Giants are fine to start free agency, and avoid getting fined by the league if they are over it at 4 pm ET on Tuesday (the Cowboys, Redskins, & Saints still have that mountain to climb though in approximately the next 44.5 hours).
•$504,000 is yet to be deducted from each team's cap number on account of the accrual of workout bonuses that will be in effect once the new league year starts in 2 days.
•Then there's the "Top 51" rule, where only the top 51 contracts of the players under contract count towards the salary cap; you'd have to add the salaries of the last 2 players on the 53-man roster to tat number once the regular season starts, and this number ceases, to go along with the salaries of the practice squad players (practice squad players make $5,700 per week).
•If you add the money for those 8 practice squaders and the last 2 players on the 53-man roster once the regular season is underway, you have $1,585,200 to account for.
•There's also "fudge money" that teams like to leave unused in case an emergency arises; teams like the Giants which typically spend close to the cap limit each year leave one to two million bucks, or so, in case a contingency plan is needed in the case of an injury.
•There's also the money needed for the Restricted Free Agents (RFAs): Cruz, S. Brown, and A. Brown---that will probably be $6,225,000 (as indicated above).
•Then there's the rookie pool money (linked above, and estimated to be $4,614,587 at this time).
•If you add these numbers up you'll get between $13,928,787 and $14,928,787.
•If we were to subtract the smaller of these two figures ($13,928,787) from the amount that the Giants are expected to be under the cap ($10,332,113), we'd get -$3,596,674.
•I'm just using these numbers, assuming that they're accurate, and assuming no further moves are going to be made.
•We still haven't taken into account the unrestricted free agents (UFAs) that that the Giants would like to re-sign (e.g., Bennett, Boothe, Hixon, Carr, & Blackburn).
•I'm assuming that Osi, Phillips, and Tynes are going to walk for the sake of this discussion, which they probably will.
•Don't forget free agents from the outside that the Giants would be interested in--I'm talking about the bargain basement variety here, not the Grade A players.
•After looking at the numbers more closely, it becomes apparent that the Giants HAVE TO make more moves as things stand now in order to be able to just sign some of their own players, forget signing players from other teams.
•They could use another ten million dollars--probably more--in freed space to just make things work out (this means signing Bennett, Boothe, Hixon, Carr, Blackburn, to go along with 1 or 2 bargain basement type free agents).
•Like I said earlier, look to restructures for Rolle and Eli to help ease this burden to go along with the flat out release or salary reduction of Diehl.
•There's still work to be done.
I'll stack up BBI against any other forum. from any other team. Thanks for your work.
I was too distracted by my hangover to interject..
so pretty much it's a nuisance suit that will go nowhere and they are hosed with the cap unless they make a Herculean effort in rejiggering the existing contracts.
5.1 Net available
-1.5 2 min + practice squad
-1.6 Jenkins signing (assume 1mm salary + .667 bonus0
= 2.0 million
I've already taken into account workout bonus and 1mm flex (although I pro forma'd in a DD reduction in salary). In either case, I do agree with your end summary; we will need to seem some form of work done with contracts for Eli, Rolle, Snee (and assume Diehl is absolutely happening).
NFL League Minimums for 2013 (depending on vested years): - ( New Window )
his play was horrendous last year
obviously, if he were not Coughlin's son-in-law, no way in hell would Giants ever consider carrying his 11 million salary cap number. That might be the most over-inflated in the NFL.
it also possibly could cause resentment among the players when they see better players getting cut and the coach's son-in-law with a ridiculous 11 million dollar cap number
It would save money against the cap.
Subtract the the Cap Number that would result from signing Brandon Moore (definitely less than Snee's amount listed above) from Snee's $4,750,000 Cap Savings if he were to be cut this offseason, and you'll still save money on this year's cap, and get a healthier player (translated as being better).
Cullen Jenkins' cap charge for 2013 is $1.816 million according to a source.
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D-Dawg - Thanks for the 411 on Jenkins from Ohm. In that case we'd subtract Jenkins's Cap Number of $1,816,000 from the amount of money that the Giants are estimated to be under the cap ($10,332,113), and we'd get a new number of $8,516,113---assuming Ohm's Cap Number for Jenkins is correct.
I'm beginning to suspect a DE in Rd. 1 as one part of that equation.
•Source: http://www.overthecap.com/cap.php?Name=Alex%20Smith&Position=QB&Team=49ers]Alex Smith's contract with the 49ers
•I forgot about Smith's cap number not officially becoming a part of the equation with KC and the Niners until AFTER the start of the new league year in 2 days, when it would become official. Good catch. Thanks.
Thank you for these posts
There's also the combined Cap number, for the Giants' 3 tendered RFAs (Cruz, S. Brown, & A. Brown) to consider:
$10,332,113 - $8,741,000 = $1,591,113
As can be seen, the Giants are estimated to be $1,591,113 under the cap at this time, about 22.5 hours before the start of free agency.