When I posted that podcast and the secret sauce was CASH willing to be spent and teams that say they are having cap problems are either unwilling to spend cash or not creative enough to figure out how to. But cash is the real spending cap. Eagles are spending 355 million—we are basically a small market team with our cash spending. Disgraceful
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exactly right. i can pick out 1 or 2 or maybe 3 more players id have liked to have added this past offseason if money were no object. l'jarious sneed, christian wilkins, and robert hunt would look great on the depth chart over adoree, nacho, gvr.
are they worth more than 1/4 $bn extra mostly borrowed from the future?
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So we should just spend to spend? You spend when you have great players. We don't. The Eagles do.
exactly right. i can pick out 1 or 2 or maybe 3 more players id have liked to have added this past offseason if money were no object. l'jarious sneed, christian wilkins, and robert hunt would look great on the depth chart over adoree, nacho, gvr.
are they worth more than 1/4 $bn extra mostly borrowed from the future?
No that is wrong because you can continue ton 1) push off the void years and 2) the present value of the money is much more valuable then when you have to pay it off later on—sort of like buying a player on mortgage where present dollars spent is more valuable then its worth down the road with a higher cap
All you need to do is look at the 05-13 giants for a lesson in how this franchise spends money when they are under the belief that they can compete for division and league titles. Then look at 14-15. Then look at 2017 when they thought they’d have a shot. They haven’t really gone all in since, save for an over stated attempt in 2021.
Build a roster with star power and the giants will keep it together and make the tough cuts elsewhere. Most of the younger ascending talents like thibs, banks, wan’dall and hopefully others will be re-signed while the bigger established stars will be kept. It will look impossible just like people here wonder how the niners do it, but the giants will find a way and let the lesser player walk.
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In comment 16593972 robbieballs2003 said:
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So we should just spend to spend? You spend when you have great players. We don't. The Eagles do.
exactly right. i can pick out 1 or 2 or maybe 3 more players id have liked to have added this past offseason if money were no object. l'jarious sneed, christian wilkins, and robert hunt would look great on the depth chart over adoree, nacho, gvr.
are they worth more than 1/4 $bn extra mostly borrowed from the future?
No that is wrong because you can continue ton 1) push off the void years and 2) the present value of the money is much more valuable then when you have to pay it off later on—sort of like buying a player on mortgage where present dollars spent is more valuable then its worth down the road with a higher cap
it isnt wrong. yes you can keep kicking it but it will eventually hit and when it hits it is dead money for inactive players that make it harder to spend on active players.
hit rates on free agents arent 100% or even 50% so a lot of this ends up being breakage. much more so than with philly where they are spending a lot of this money extending their own already effective players like devonta, dickerson, ajb, etc.
Hard to conclude we won't look back on this in 5 years with 1 of 2 conclusions:
(a) Howie was once again smarter than everyone, found a loophole, exploited it thereby forcing the league to intervene and/or other teams to follow suit
or
(b) The Eagles will be in serious cap hell and are staring down a multi-year reset once all is said and done
I lean to (b) but that is mainly on the belief that eventually the cap won't keep increasing at the current rate. If it does, the "time value of money" argument could hold but seems unlikely as eventually the cap will have to stabilize. NFL is making all kinds of money right now (driving cap expansion) but were this kind of expansion seen in other business markets one might call it a bubble...
Lots and lots of different charts, but I challenge anyone to find the $355M number for the Eagles mentioned in Jason's tweet at the OTC site.
Since people aren't encouraged to understand what the numbers mean, they draw blunt and meaningless conclusions like "there is no cap."
The tweet says six other teams are over $300M and doesn't even tell you how close "over $300M" is to the Eagles $355M.
So where's the "order of magnitude" and how do you even know what numbers you're comparing, since you can't readily find them at the OTC site?
Player development is key this season. We want this to work.
Barkley had a below average season last year. Why pay a guy more when they are coming off a poor season that followed 8 games the previous season that were below average? I just think the Giants thought he was worth less than what he got
Lots and lots of different charts, but I challenge anyone to find the $355M number for the Eagles mentioned in Jason's tweet at the OTC site.
Since people aren't encouraged to understand what the numbers mean, they draw blunt and meaningless conclusions like "there is no cap."
I like the value-add the sites offer, but listening to Jason et al talk about NYG and other teams on his and other pods, it's very clear they lack attention to detail outside the cap area, and speak about roster construction and player evaluation with an arrogance that doesn't synch up with their expertise.
I believe the giants most definitely could have kept Barkley while still doing everything else this offseason. I think they just didn’t want to pay him that kind of money. They want to spend the money on other positions. I think Schoen and Daboll cautiously envision a few different scenarios by March 2025:
—-either jones is extended or the giants explore FA QBs OR they draft a QB. If he’s extended they obviously liked what jones did in 24 and if so, they will add another piece to the offense next offseason unless Hyatt shows staying power. If they release jones and land the qb in FA they can allocate much of DJ’s savings to that new qb for that first year or so. They then use the draft to put the finishing touches on the defense. They would be fine long term, financially as the above graph shows. If they don’t land a QB in fa they draft one and spend FA money on the defense as they will have used many draft picks on the qb.
Hard to conclude we won't look back on this in 5 years with 1 of 2 conclusions:
(a) Howie was once again smarter than everyone, found a loophole, exploited it thereby forcing the league to intervene and/or other teams to follow suit
or
(b) The Eagles will be in serious cap hell and are staring down a multi-year reset once all is said and done
I lean to (b) but that is mainly on the belief that eventually the cap won't keep increasing at the current rate. If it does, the "time value of money" argument could hold but seems unlikely as eventually the cap will have to stabilize. NFL is making all kinds of money right now (driving cap expansion) but were this kind of expansion seen in other business markets one might call it a bubble...
this may sound like a cop out but i think it's just a strategic choice not one or the other. take the present day benefit of (a) at the comparable future risk of (b).
nobody can predict the future but its a pretty simple risk swap. increase the chances of success by some % in present day in return for increasing future risk that would lower chances of success in future by a similar amount (even if slightly discounted bc of the negative interest rate of the future).
if it wins a SB it will be worth it but that's true of any of the varied strategies in the NFL. The Rams traded their first round picks like 7 years in a row. I dont think anyone would say that's a no brainer to copy cat, but for them it worked. the broncos won their Peyton SB with a team of FA mercenaries, but it only worked bc of the weird circumstances that allowed them to get Peyton for free. same with Bucs/Brady.
Lots and lots of different charts, but I challenge anyone to find the $355M number for the Eagles mentioned in Jason's tweet at the OTC site.
Since people aren't encouraged to understand what the numbers mean, they draw blunt and meaningless conclusions like "there is no cap."
spotrac isnt as accurate as OTC but this is probably right in terms of rankings (it lines up with the use of void years and jasons rankings even if the #'s are off).
https://www.spotrac.com/nfl/cash/_/year/2024/sort/cash_total - ( New Window )
The problem with the Giants is they play johnny dike every off-season fixing holes instead of burning it down and getting the QB in the next draft.
For starters, it's exceptionally important to separate a financial decision from an accounting decision. How much cash you spend, and more importantly how much of it is guaranteed (fully and practically) is absolutely a financial decision. How and when it's represented on the balance sheet of a year(s) salary cap is an accounting decision.
I pulled this together from Spotrac data last week. This is all cash commitments made for the league as of Thursday last week. This doesn't mean all of it all will be paid, this is just commitments. Some of these dollars are not guaranteed. And will never be paid.
Just looking at this year is bad data. If the team made a shit ton of commitments last year, and eased up this year, doesn't mean they are cheap.
So then the question to ask about Eric's table is how much of that money on void years today is fully or practically guaranteed.
Putting an option bonus on a void year, and if that option bonus isn't practically guaranteed is essentially saying we *might* pay you that money. Similar as if a team gives a player a big salary in the 5th year of contract that's not guaranteed. That shows up on the ledgers but it's not a real commitment.
The typical void year was used to stretch a bonus further than the contract years, and accept you'll account for money paid to a player after their gone.
The way the Eagles use option bonuses is a degree more complicated than that.
Not a cop out at all. There is definitely a game theory element here that if the Eagles can get the other teams to follow suit then the playing field becomes level as the new normal. Until I've seen evidence otherwise I will continue to view Howie as one of the best in the business and so it is very possible he's just ahead of the curve here.
But there is the possibility (as with other markets) that there is a bubble right now (cap and team valuations) and so if there is a correction then teams that have over-extended will pay a large penalty. Right now the Eagles would "seem" to be one of those teams.
the right most column is total cash, next to that is dead, and next to that is active.
https://www.spotrac.com/nfl/cash/_/year/2024/sort/cash_total/dir/desc - ( New Window )
spotrac isnt as accurate as OTC but this is probably right in terms of rankings (it lines up with the use of void years and jasons rankings even if the #'s are off). https://www.spotrac.com/nfl/cash/_/year/2024/sort/cash_total - ( New Window )
Thanks for that and I encourage people to look at the link, which shows the Eagles don't even lead in cash spending for 2024 and are not that different from a number of other teams.
Jason evidently came up with some different definition of "cash" to get a number he wanted to put in his tweet. What exactly that definition is, there is no apparent way to know.
I have a good mental handle on the traditional bonuses and schedules, but the way the Eagles use option bonuses is still hard for me to grasp.
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this may sound like a cop out but i think it's just a strategic choice not one or the other. take the present day benefit of (a) at the comparable future risk of (b).
Not a cop out at all. There is definitely a game theory element here that if the Eagles can get the other teams to follow suit then the playing field becomes level as the new normal. Until I've seen evidence otherwise I will continue to view Howie as one of the best in the business and so it is very possible he's just ahead of the curve here.
But there is the possibility (as with other markets) that there is a bubble right now (cap and team valuations) and so if there is a correction then teams that have over-extended will pay a large penalty. Right now the Eagles would "seem" to be one of those teams.
I agree howie is one of the best, whether or not he is ahead of the game, i think that's just framing that isnt exactly right.
Let's use poker as an analogy, when the offseason starts every NFL GM is holding a slightly different hand with their roster and it is pre-flop. Even if you are the chiefs holding AA where you are almost certain to play the hand as aggressively as possible, there are still a lot of ways to lose. And if you are holding AA, it may not even make sense to play it aggressive because if you go too aggressive you may win that hand but with less money in the pot. So you may gain quicker at the expense of the bigger strategic win of building a bigger pot to win (like say if they'd extended Tyreek/Sneed instead of trading them for picks). So there is a strategic component that just comes down to style choice and future luck that nobody can predict bc it's a blind bet (just like the flop).
Because Howie has been a great GM for a while i think he entered the offseason holding something like K/10 suited. There arent many at the table holding better cards than him. That is where i see his skill level being something other teams should be working hard to emulate bc better cards = better odds of success.
We know he is an aggressive player so pre-flop he always bets big, that's where im not as sure. If he flops a sirianni firing, his big bet wont look so good and he will be playing future hands with a shorter stack. how he bets doesnt so much change the odds - the cards do. so its just a question of how big to bet knowing there's unknowns in the outcome?
and applied to a team like NYG, the question would be how big to bet with much more mediocre cards? or how much is it worth paying to only slightly upgrade your mediocre cards to mediocre+ preflop? are you willing to increase your bet to go from 6-8 to 8-Q?
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So we should just spend to spend? You spend when you have great players. We don't. The Eagles do.
exactly right. i can pick out 1 or 2 or maybe 3 more players id have liked to have added this past offseason if money were no object. l'jarious sneed, christian wilkins, and robert hunt would look great on the depth chart over adoree, nacho, gvr.
are they worth more than 1/4 $bn extra mostly borrowed from the future?
And then everyone would whine that the Giants' front office is supidely in win now mode. You can't win no matter what you do with horrible fans....
And you're not serious about trying to understand how the inner working of a team go....
The problem with the Giants is they play johnny dike every off-season fixing holes instead of burning it down and getting the QB in the next draft.
Not really true. The Giants have “burned it down” on a few occasions. They did so in 14. Didn’t spend at all heading in to 15 and let Coughlin twist in the winds of one of the cheapest and lousiest defense in the league. They did so again in 2019 when they traded away guys like Beckham and JPP. They just haven’t drafted well and the fa moves made after their rebuilds also failed to pay off.
It’s all about the draft and player development.
But when the bill comes due, the cap will be higher meaningful that % wise it has less of an affect in the future than it would today. So unless the cap unexpectedly goes up less than predictions or not at all, they come out ahead
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Is going to come due, sooner or later for the Eagles. Hopefully it takes them a long long time to pay up.
But when the bill comes due, the cap will be higher meaningful that % wise it has less of an affect in the future than it would today. So unless the cap unexpectedly goes up less than predictions or not at all, they come out ahead
This was my thought, too. 100% of deferred money now will likely be paid back at about 80% of the effective cap rate in a few seasons. It's basically borrowing a dollar and having to pay 80 cents or so back in 3-4 years.
Not saying it's the best way, but when you lose the majority of games you attend no matter the distance or the elements as a fan, it has its appeal.
But even if the cap stayed flat, spending cap space tomorrow to get more cashing working for you today is the right answer. And everyone does that. That's exactly what a signing bonus is.
The real question isn't using cap space from the future. The question is in what form and what risk are you willing to take.
A useful thought exercise: what would happen this coming year if every player who has future guaranteed money or previously paid/unaccounted for dollars on the balance sheet got cut today?
That's the maximum risk sitting out there. That's the worst case everything comes due scenario.
And then you do a probability analysis of what will likely happen this coming year.
- What dead money do I have on true void years?
- Who is likely to be cut or retire?
- What option bonuses will accelerate?
And then you budget a percentage of your balance sheet to account for those likelihoods.
I looked at this the other day, the Eagles have carried like ~60M in dead money each year for the last 4 years. They plan for a very substantial amount of paying off old bills.
I think it's a bad characterization the Eagles have this volatile liability out there that's going to sneak up on them.
Much more likely is they will keep to their schedule. And like every team, their success will based on whether they picked the right players to pay.
What I do see is that the Eagles’ note never seems to come due.
What I do see is that the Eagles’ note never seems to come due.
Because there is no note. And if you balance your accounting correctly there isn't a tidal wave that destroys your ability to operate.
What there are are some functional minimums to operate each year, and our friend Dave Gettleman actually found away to approach that once.
You almost have to try to get yourself in a position where you can't reasonably push cap hits forward and operate responsibly.
It's about being planful and calculated.
The other option is to pay as you go each year and have fewer dollars working for you.
If players didn't age, you could push the money out indefinitely. But if you owe something on guys that can't play, then you'd get into some trouble.
Disclaimer, I don't really follow the details of the NFL cap, but I understand general concepts.
If players didn't age, you could push the money out indefinitely. But if you owe something on guys that can't play, then you'd get into some trouble.
Disclaimer, I don't really follow the details of the NFL cap, but I understand general concepts.
A team can certainly have a big dead money cap charge if they've restructured a contract many times and converted salary into bonus, or if they cut or trade a player with a lots of remaining cap charge to account. And if you have several of those players the same year, you can definitely impact your ability to operate that year.
Often times that's by design and a purposeful reset. The Rams and Bears have famously done this recently. Realized the nucleus isn't working and cut or trade them. Or you can just absorb some hits, and roll your borrowing forward.
I bring up the Eagles again, because they've had a controlled burn on their agreements that ended or didn't work out. They've carried ~60M in dead space for several years running. And they presumably will just spend more in the future to make up difference each year.
If you can instrument that correctly, you can get more cash working for you.
Then let us into the games for free, give us all the merch for free and the food at the games, too. Until then, we are clients with the right to complain. they also have the right to spend and do as they see fit and risk losing us (which they know will never happen). But this is not telling your neighbor to clean up his lawn so that you can get better home value.
Because that can never have ramifications on the wider community.
You're fine if your neighbour spends it on crack? I'm sure you'd have some words to say to someone about it.