to the tune of $27 million and now have $29 million in salary cap space headed into the season. Fourth most in the league.
Jerry Jones continues to write checks:
Lawrence $15 million restructured bonus
Martin $10 million restructured bonus
Smith $7 million restructured bonus
Is Jerry getting ready to negotiate with Dak or do they tag him again at the end of the season to the tune of $37.1 million?
Granted, I"m not a big believer that the Cowboys are these cap geniuses as they continue to lose players. The key is that they draft well and often take care of their priority players early to what look like obscene contracts but the players are young enough to last through much of the contract.
Smith is breaking down. He is an absolute stud when healthy but that seems to be less frequent each year. Even with all of his restructuring over the years, the cap hit or dead cap hit for him the next 2 years is less than what we are on the books for Solder... ughhh.
The saints have been going all out to try and win it this year, because they will have to cut their roster next year. They are projected to be about 70 million over the minimum salary cap next year
Smith is breaking down. He is an absolute stud when healthy but that seems to be less frequent each year. Even with all of his restructuring over the years, the cap hit or dead cap hit for him the next 2 years is less than what we are on the books for Solder... ughhh.
Really? The Solder decision and related contract is not only one of the bigger failures in Giant history but also the entire NFL.
The reason they can do this is because they have some pretty good players to piggy back these deals on.
All three guys will get paid well the next 4 years. But all of them can be off the books with minimal cap implications by 32.
The cowboys have been paying the piper. Look how many players they have lost in recent years. Robert quinn, witten, Fleming, byron jones, heath and maliek collins. That is just this year. Since 2017 they have lost Hitchens, Jonathan cooper, dez Bryant, Beasley, Cobb, david Irving, church, and Brandon Carr. They will face more challenges next year as I mentioned, because they are up against the minimum salary cap next year without signing Prescott.
The cowboys have also been riding on the coattails of their offensive line, but even that is starting to fade. They lost frederick. Tyron smith has not played a full season in 4 years and they are trying to figure out who will be starting at right tackle
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Smith is breaking down. He is an absolute stud when healthy but that seems to be less frequent each year. Even with all of his restructuring over the years, the cap hit or dead cap hit for him the next 2 years is less than what we are on the books for Solder... ughhh.
Really? The Solder decision and related contract is not only one of the bigger failures in Giant history but also the entire NFL.
It’s crazy, it jumped out at me too when looking at Smith’s deal.
The Cowboys can cut him before next year at age 30 and incur an 8M dead cap hit. The Giants will cut Solder before next year at age 33 with a 13M dead cap hit.
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But this money doesn’t just disappear off the books. If they have cleared $27M this season and I see other posters saying this was done in preparation for the declining cap next season, when does the it come time to pay the piper?
The cowboys have been paying the piper. Look how many players they have lost in recent years. Robert quinn, witten, Fleming, byron jones, heath and maliek collins. That is just this year. Since 2017 they have lost Hitchens, Jonathan cooper, dez Bryant, Beasley, Cobb, david Irving, church, and Brandon Carr. They will face more challenges next year as I mentioned, because they are up against the minimum salary cap next year without signing Prescott.
The cowboys have also been riding on the coattails of their offensive line, but even that is starting to fade. They lost frederick. Tyron smith has not played a full season in 4 years and they are trying to figure out who will be starting at right tackle
Dallas loses players because Stephen Jones refuses to pay exorbitant free agent salaries that are now common in the NFL.
Under this category you can put Jones, Quinn, Hitchens, Cobb, Collins, Beasley, and Church. All got above market salaries. That's not where Jones shops.
Players like Witten(should have stayed retired), Heath, Bryant, Cooper, and Carr it was just time to move on. David Irving was bipolar and a head case, he just retired.
Dallas doesn't lose players because of the cap. If Dallas wants you, they will resign you. But if you don't come in on their terms, they will walk away from the negotiations.
Earl Thomas is a perfect example. He has been courting Dallas for three years now, but his asking price is too high. Dallas wants him on the cheap. Everson Griffen is another example. The two sides were going back and forth for months, and nothing. Then Griffen dropped his price and Dallas signed him.
I like the cheapness of Stephen Jones. It may cost Dallas players for not wanting to pay. But in the long run if the player doesn't work out it doesn't mess up the salary cap.
I've been talking about this since the Tyron Smith contract and when you do this on an orginizational level it can give you a competitive advantage when it comes to the cap. Most teams are too narrow in their focus. What if we sign a guy to a 7 year contract and he goes down with a career ender? What they don't think about is the cap perpetually going up and the back half of contracts from an AAV persepctive generally looks pretty favorable to the team. When you do this on the orginizational level it also spreads the risk over lots of contracts and not just one superstar you put your eggs in the basket with.
When you convert base salary to signing bonus, it's all payable immediately but the cap hit is spread out over the remaining years of the contract. So if they convert $16M to bonus and the player has three years left (after 2020) on the contract, the cap hit for the remaining three years goes up by $4 million a year. ($4M this year, $4M next year, $4M 2022 and 2023, all just to account for bonus) So you are paying the money now but spreading out that cap money over future years.
HOWEVER:
If the player is released or traded before the contract is complete, all that bonus money accelerates. If they convert $16 of 2020 salary to bonus, and release that player after 2021 with two years left on his deal, that $8M for the last two years hits the books right away as dead money against the cap.
So I believe this is a way to clear cap space for this season and shift the cap hit to the next several years. It makes sense if you need space now and you think the cap is going up, or that you're going to get some expensive players off the books. If you have a bunch of stars, or if the cap goes down, you end up with cap problems. I think.
Do I have that right?
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But this money doesn’t just disappear off the books. If they have cleared $27M this season and I see other posters saying this was done in preparation for the declining cap next season, when does the it come time to pay the piper?
The cowboys have been paying the piper. Look how many players they have lost in recent years. Robert quinn, witten, Fleming, byron jones, heath and maliek collins. That is just this year. Since 2017 they have lost Hitchens, Jonathan cooper, dez Bryant, Beasley, Cobb, david Irving, church, and Brandon Carr. They will face more challenges next year as I mentioned, because they are up against the minimum salary cap next year without signing Prescott.
The cowboys have also been riding on the coattails of their offensive line, but even that is starting to fade. They lost frederick. Tyron smith has not played a full season in 4 years and they are trying to figure out who will be starting at right tackle
You would have thought a damn owl flew in my room as I was reading that list aloud.... ;) There were some big names in that list, and some stretches. Many of those folks were probably just allowed to leave for upgrades. Or were at the end of their useful playing careers.
Also, and we go through this almost every week, you can figure out the cap for 95% of players if you are playing guys who are elite and who you drafted. It’s the bryon Jones of the world where it becomes more sketchy, but frankly when is the last time the giants drafted well enough to even need to give out a no brainer second contract? Reese was obviously horrible at this and despite some of the draft love Gettleman gets (and early picks) we likely aren’t doing one this offseason. Barkley we have for 2 more and I can’t think of anyone else worthy can you?
Also, and we go through this almost every week, you can figure out the cap for 95% of players if you are playing guys who are elite and who you drafted. It’s the bryon Jones of the world where it becomes more sketchy, but frankly when is the last time the giants drafted well enough to even need to give out a no brainer second contract? Reese was obviously horrible at this and despite some of the draft love Gettleman gets (and early picks) we likely aren’t doing one this offseason. Barkley we have for 2 more and I can’t think of anyone else worthy can you?
I think that's the most insidious thing about drafting poorly. You give guys that the good teams let walk and don't think twice about paying them above market value because you have the money and don't want to lose the little talent you have. This is why FA generally doesn't work out. Teams don't let their players walk if they are looking for close to their true market value.