Cap Space ... the Final Frontier

[Brokenstriker]

I'd be interested in hearing what some of the more informed, or obsessed, regulars in here think about working the cap and creating space. How can they, what do you think they will do ... etc. Especially as a function of the new signings.

Words out that Springs will be released. Assume that is directly related to signing Hall.

Are there dots to connect re: cap space related to signing AH?

Who are the targets to be released, or strong armed into restructuring (that hasn't already happened)?

etc. ...

[Redskinmayhem]

I'd be interested in hearing what some of the more informed, or obsessed, regulars in here think about working the cap and creating space. How can they, what do you think they will do ... etc. Especially as a function of the new signings.

Words out that Springs will be released. Assume that is directly related to signing Hall.

Are there dots to connect re: cap space related to signing AH?

Who are the targets to be released, or strong armed into restructuring (that hasn't already happened)?

etc. ...

I'm not a capologist but look for more cuts...ARE specifically.

[SkinsfaninNJ]

Anyone who restructured is staying because they now have more guaranteed money. That means ARE, Griffin, Carter and Samuels are staying. Taylor is a prime candidate to be cut because we would free up the exact amount of cap space as his contract $8M+. We already know Snyder can do some serious damage with just $8M of cap space.

But I still don't think Taylor gets cut. Perhaps he restructures. I can't think of a lot of guys we can cut now that would pay off on the cap. Jansen would not this year to my understanding.

Perhaps a few more guys will restructure. Can we restructure Hall and Haynesworth now?

[firehawk157]

I'm not a capologist but look for more cuts...ARE specifically.
ARE just got a new deal, we wouldn't have restructed him if we planned on cutting him.

Here's what I've heard about the Haynesworth deal... $41M in the first three years and $32M in the first 13 months. What this shows to me is, based on verbiage, is we are giving Haynesworth a combined $9M of bonuses (guaranteed) and salary in year 3. Year 2 sounds like it's loaded with a huge bonus (the first 13 months part) which will likely pick up on March 1st and is also guaranteed. Just based on this, I think the signing bonus was relatively low (somewhere in the $20M range) and we're looking at a relatively low salary figure (somewhere in the $5M-$6M range). So the cap figure for Haynesworth, this year, I expect is somewhere in the $9M-10M range. That's just my best shot at it based on what I heard.

[firehawk157]

Anyone who restructured is staying because they now have more guaranteed money. That means ARE, Griffin, Carter and Samuels are staying. Taylor is a prime candidate to be cut because we would free up the exact amount of cap space as his contract $8M+. We already know Snyder can do some serious damage with just $8M of cap space.

But I still don't think Taylor gets cut. Perhaps he restructures. I can't think of a lot of guys we can cut now that would pay off on the cap. Jansen would not this year to my understanding.

Perhaps a few more guys will restructure. Can we restructure Hall and Haynesworth now?
We could, but it would be essentially useless. Why not just sign the contract with the restructure in it? Based on what I've heard about the Haynesworth contract, I expect we made it with the idea of restructuring it in year 2 if the cap stays.

[Redskinmayhem]

ARE just got a new deal, we wouldn't have restructed him if we planned on cutting him.

Is it possible they gave him more money up front to make it less of a cap hit to cut him?

[AliBabba]

We could, but it would be essentially useless. Why not just sign the contract with the restructure in it? Based on what I've heard about the Haynesworth contract, I expect we made it with the idea of restructuring it in year 2 if the cap stays.
i think he was kidding .....

The Haynesworth deal from all I the numbers i've seen is clearly structured to take advantage of the uncapped season(s) ... Snyder figures that we are getting the best player out there now for the next two years and if there is even football in 2011 he can deal with the issue then or it may be a non-issue if no cap is established

[Redskin4Life]

Is it possible they gave him more money up front to make it less of a cap hit to cut him?
The cap doesn't work like that... if we gave ARE more money upfront, that's a BIGGER hit on the cap (dead money specifically) if he were cut. Sorry but ARE isn't going anywhere.

Alibaba hit it right on the head... Haynesworth and Hall probably got option bonuses in the uncapped year. If there's no cap, they get paid those bonuses immediately... if not, then their deals get extended and money gets moved around.

[akhhorus]

ARE just restructured so we can dump him after next season.

I have a feeling that we've set things up so that in case there's no cap next year, we can immediately increase payments to both Hall and Haynesworth to clear away future cap charges.

[firehawk157]

That doesn't make any sense whatsoever. Basically, what we did was convert some of his salary into signing bonus money (I'll show you how this works in a couple of minutes) and that divides that money equally between the remaining years of the contract. However, if you cut him, you will then accelerate all that money onto the current dead cap hit whereas it wouldn't have if you kept it as salary. Here's an example of how this works (I hope it turns out alright).

Player X - Original Contract 5 yrs $10M signing $20M in salary, incentives, etc.

Year 1 Year 2 Year 3 Year 4 Year 5
$2M SB $2M SB $2M SB $2M SB $2M SB
$2M salary $3M salary $4M salary $5M salary $6M salary
$4M cap hit $5M cap hit $6M cap hit $7M cap hit $8M cap hit

So let's say it's year 3, you have three choices. Let him play out the contract for the year ($5M hit), let him restructure and convert part of the salary to a new signing bonus (SB) and we'll look at that next or cut him. If you cut him, you can see that you still have $6M worth of signing bonus that HASN'T counted against your cap. Therefore, those $6M will come due and will count against your cap in year 3. However, for easy math, what I will do is say that we coverted $3M in salary to signing bonuses and added a year.

Year 3 Year 4 Year 5
$2M original SB $2M original SB $2M original SB
$1M new SB $1M new SB $1M new SB
$1M new salary $5M salary $6M new salary
$4M cap hit $8M cap hit $9M cap hit

We shed $2M in cap space but we end up losing $2M over the next two years.

Keep in mind, that this is the basic idea of what we do. We are a bit more complicated than this in that we add years and options where we can essentially void out the deal (thus negating some of this new salary bonus) but raising salary later.

Short answer, in the second scenario, if you restructure but then cut him, you are not only on the hook for the original $6M of the unaccounted for salary cap, you are now on the hook for the $3M you just gave him for the restructure.

[shally]

ARE just restructured so we can dump him after next season.

I have a feeling that we've set things up so that in case there's no cap next year, we can immediately increase payments to both Hall and Haynesworth to clear away future cap charges.

that is the fail=safe for snyder

if things dont work out,he can dump contracts in an uncapped year and start over

definitely a roll of the dice, but typical

[AliBabba]

I have a feeling that we've set things up so that in case there's no cap next year, we can immediately increase payments to both Hall and Haynesworth to clear away future cap charges.

Yeah, that's basically what I said, except that I'm 99% sure there won't be a cap next year and Snyder's just playing the future money game again. People can say what they will about it but really, Schaffer's captricks have never actually hurt anything but Snyder's own bottomline. The only time their cap situation appears dire is the week leading into FA then they go and spend $155M within the first 6 hours, lol

[firehawk157]

Based on what I've seen, I see how he could work it if there's no uncapped year. Just because there's $41M in guaranteed money in the first 3 years, doesn't mean that he'll cost us $14M in cap charges for the first 3 years.

[AliBabba]

Based on what I've seen, I see how he could work it if there's no uncapped year. Just because there's $41M in guaranteed money in the first 3 years, doesn't mean that he'll cost us $14M in cap charges for the first 3 years.
The point is not that he will cost $41M+ in cap charges the first 3 years ... the point is that if the cap is removed he can cost that much if the FO believes that helps them down the line

[shally]

Yeah, that's basically what I said, except that I'm 99% sure there won't be a cap next year and Snyder's just playing the future money game again. People can say what they will about it but really, Schaffer's captricks have never actually hurt anything but Snyder's own bottomline. The only time their cap situation appears dire is the week leading into FA then they go and spend $155M within the first 6 hours, lol

absolute truth !! we have never been in cap hell despite all the predictions

what has actually hurt us is that the players have not played up to expectations.
guys like duckett, lloyd, arch were errors in judgement

[SkinsfaninNJ]

We could, but it would be essentially useless. Why not just sign the contract with the restructure in it? Based on what I've heard about the Haynesworth contract, I expect we made it with the idea of restructuring it in year 2 if the cap stays.

I was trying to be a smart***

[akhhorus]

Yeah, that's basically what I said, except that I'm 99% sure there won't be a cap next year and Snyder's just playing the future money game again. People can say what they will about it but really, Schaffer's captricks have never actually hurt anything but Snyder's own bottomline. The only time their cap situation appears dire is the week leading into FA then they go and spend $155M within the first 6 hours, lol

Agreed 100%.

Based on what I've seen, I see how he could work it if there's no uncapped year. Just because there's $41M in guaranteed money in the first 3 years, doesn't mean that he'll cost us $14M in cap charges for the first 3 years.

It really doesn't matter much whats in the deal if there's an uncapped year. The skins could give him an entirely new deal for the same amount of money, only with 70 million of it paid out in 2010.

[skinfan43]

absolute truth !! we have never been in cap hell despite all the predictions

what has actually hurt us is that the players have not played up to expectations.
guys like duckett, lloyd, arch were errors in judgement
Just posted the same thing last night... bingo!

[AliBabba]

Agreed 100%.



It really doesn't matter much whats in the deal if there's an uncapped year. The skins could give him an entirely new deal for the same amount of money, only with 70 million of it paid out in 2010.
And I would not put it past Snyder to do so, he's known for being kinda reckless with those greenbacks ... if he did that though he'd be shooting himself in the foot because moves like that will be enough to rally the owners to reinstitue a cap ASAP before Jerry/Danny is the next Steinbrenner/Henry-Luchino

that wouldn't stop him from doing so though

[hail2skins]

I'm not a capologist but look for more cuts...ARE specifically.Huh!!!! He just restructured his contract.

[akhhorus]

That doesn't make any sense whatsoever. Basically, what we did was convert some of his salary into signing bonus money (I'll show you how this works in a couple of minutes) and that divides that money equally between the remaining years of the contract. However, if you cut him, you will then accelerate all that money onto the current dead cap hit whereas it wouldn't have if you kept it as salary. Here's an example of how this works (I hope it turns out alright).

Player X - Original Contract 5 yrs $10M signing $20M in salary, incentives, etc.

Year 1 Year 2 Year 3 Year 4 Year 5
$2M SB $2M SB $2M SB $2M SB $2M SB
$2M salary $3M salary $4M salary $5M salary $6M salary
$4M cap hit $5M cap hit $6M cap hit $7M cap hit $8M cap hit

So let's say it's year 3, you have three choices. Let him play out the contract for the year ($5M hit), let him restructure and convert part of the salary to a new signing bonus (SB) and we'll look at that next or cut him. If you cut him, you can see that you still have $6M worth of signing bonus that HASN'T counted against your cap. Therefore, those $6M will come due and will count against your cap in year 3. However, for easy math, what I will do is say that we coverted $3M in salary to signing bonuses and added a year.

Year 3 Year 4 Year 5
$2M original SB $2M original SB $2M original SB
$1M new SB $1M new SB $1M new SB
$1M new salary $5M salary $6M new salary
$4M cap hit $8M cap hit $9M cap hit

We shed $2M in cap space but we end up losing $2M over the next two years.

Keep in mind, that this is the basic idea of what we do. We are a bit more complicated than this in that we add years and options where we can essentially void out the deal (thus negating some of this new salary bonus) but raising salary later.

Short answer, in the second scenario, if you restructure but then cut him, you are not only on the hook for the original $6M of the unaccounted for salary cap, you are now on the hook for the $3M you just gave him for the restructure.

Except thats not what we did with ARE. We reduced his salaries/cap charges over 09 and 10. Then we have an option to keep him for a massive roster bonus, or we can pass and increase his salary for 2011 along with a voiding of his deal. Brass tax: if there's no cap, we're cutting ARE. If so, we'll reject the option and void him.

[BurgundyNGold]

I think they're banking on an uncapped year in 2010 where they can shovel all of their dead and guaranteed space to clean the cap.

[RedskinsDave]

ARE just restructured so we can dump him after next season.

I have a feeling that we've set things up so that in case there's no cap next year, we can immediately increase payments to both Hall and Haynesworth to clear away future cap charges.

Part of the deal in the uncapped year prevents a team from increasing a player's salary by more than 30% from the previous year. It's their way of telling someone like Snyder he can't have a Yankees payroll for one season.

[akhhorus]

Part of the deal in the uncapped year prevents a team from increasing a player's salary by more than 30% from the previous year. It's their way of telling someone like Snyder he can't have a Yankees payroll for one season.

I wonder if its base salary or total pay. And I wonder if that applies if Snyder just gives him a new contract.

[RedskinsDave]

This is done by a Ravens fan but still a very good break down of the coming "uncapped" year:

http://www.profootball24x7.com/column_view.php?cid=46&aid=3261&view=archive

[colkurtz]

BL - players who won't restructure will be cut. Springs was let out the door the first day.

I've never been worried about the cap hell that is predicted EVERY SINGLE YEAR. It's simply an easy story to get a rise from people. Worst case is that you release FA, eat tons of dead money and are forced to live off the draft.

[akhhorus]

This is done by a Ravens fan but still a very good break down of the coming "uncapped" year:

http://www.profootball24x7.com/column_view.php?cid=46&aid=3261&view=archive

If thats true, then Snyder can still play around with the numbers. He's changed cap figures since then more than 30% either way. Again if true, Snyder can just give Haynesworth a 30 million dollar roster/likely to be earned performance/option bonus next year to clear out some of the future cap charges.

[dj_stouty]

what has actually hurt us is that the players have not played up to expectations.
guys like duckett, lloyd, arch were errors in judgement

Add ARE's contract to Duckett, Lloyd and Arch's contracts and you basically have Albert's 100 million dollar contract. Seeing that Duckett, Lloyd and Arch combined for 19 starts and poop to show for it...and seeing that ARE has not lived up to his 30 million dollar hype; I think paying the league's (arguably) most dominant d-lineman the same money is not too much of a stretch. Albert could fall short of his previous levels and we will still technically be ahead of our past blunders. lol

[RedskinsDave]

If thats true, then Snyder can still play around with the numbers. He's changed cap figures since then more than 30% either way. Again if true, Snyder can just give Haynesworth a 30 million dollar roster/likely to be earned performance/option bonus next year to clear out some of the future cap charges.

From what I have seen, the 30% includes all the money. I am sure there are ways around it but LTBE and option bonuses are accelerated for the year.

[Redskinmayhem]

Huh!!!! He just restructured his contract.

yea, my mistake...I thought they restructured and gave him some money up front so they could cut him this year w/ less of a cap hit than before.

[akhhorus]

From what I have seen, the 30% includes all the money. I am sure there are ways around it but LTBE and option bonuses are accelerated for the year.

I think this is only known to the league and the teams. We've changed 4 players' overall salaries this year more than 30% with some complicated deals. I don't think this uncapped year will present much problem to the skins if they want to take advantage of it to pay off a lot of Bert's contract.

[colkurtz]

Add ARE's contract to Duckett, Lloyd and Arch's contracts and you basically have Albert's 100 million dollar contract. Seeing that Duckett, Lloyd and Arch combined for 19 starts and poop to show for it...and seeing that ARE has not lived up to his 30 million dollar hype; I think paying the league's (arguably) most dominant d-lineman the same money is not too much of a stretch. Albert could fall short of his previous levels and we will still technically be ahead of our past blunders. lol

Agreed. If AH plays well this defense will be transformed. Frankly, we need an eventual replacement for Griffin - who has been the cornerstone for this defense.

For all the Monty/Gholston man-love, they just aren't very good.

[SkinsfaninNJ]

Agreed. If AH plays well this defense will be transformed. Frankly, we need an eventual replacement for Griffin - who has been the cornerstone for this defense.

For all the Monty/Gholston man-love, they just aren't very good.

I was particularly disappointed with Golston last year.

[AliBabba]

I think this is only known to the league and the teams. We've changed 4 players' overall salaries this year more than 30% with some complicated deals. I don't think this uncapped year will present much problem to the skins if they want to take advantage of it to pay off a lot of Bert's contract.
I don't think caponomics have ever presented much of a problem for this FO

[bergiemoore]

I don't think caponomics have ever presented much of a problem for this FO

Danny will be the Steinbrenner of the NFL.

[silverspring]

Agreed. If AH plays well this defense will be transformed. Frankly, we need an eventual replacement for Griffin - who has been the cornerstone for this defense.

For all the Monty/Gholston man-love, they just aren't very good.

Monty/Golston were asked to be #1 guys last year, they aren't, they can't get that push. But I think they will shine when you put them next to a guy like haynesworth. This is the point of him, he demands a double team and the rest of the defense is free to terrorize.

[JoeJacksonTaylor28]

absolute truth !! we have never been in cap hell despite all the predictions

what has actually hurt us is that the players have not played up to expectations.
guys like duckett, lloyd, arch were errors in judgement
Yep... the people taking care of the salary cap management deserve the Super Bowl every year... the people judging talent... well... you all know what Cerrato deserves.

[Brokenstriker]

Does AH mean we should keep someone like Evans or let him go? Would an Evans become an effective starter next to AH? Does AH increase or decrease the case for keeping Jason Taylor?

[silverspring]

Does anyone have any idea at all how much cap space we have left right now?

[tuckahoeskin]

Does AH mean we should keep someone like Evans or let him go? Would an Evans become an effective starter next to AH? Does AH increase or decrease the case for keeping Jason Taylor?

Since AH just got introduced with Evans' number 92, I take that as a sign that Evans' days here are short.

[skinsfan36]

Does anyone have any idea at all how much cap space we have left right now?

think we are over by a few million lol