Let's talk salary cap (3 Viewers)

[St. Geezy]

I doubt very much they will get rid of Carr. He has already renegotiated and extended. They will have to do this again, stretch the 3 years they owe him over 5. I really hate this way of doing business.

BREAKING NEWS: NFL team signs player to a 4 year $150m mega-contract with $100m in guarantees, becomes stuck with him for at least three seasons, faces potential severe cap complications for releasing him before end of contract.

(We’ll just conveniently ignore the fact that said cap strategy enabled us to sign the highest paid free agent of that off-season to said mega contract despite being nearly $100m over the cap going into that year, proving that numbers can indeed be moved when we actively choose to sign free agents).

 

[lilvipa221]

Ah yes, the injuries, poor drafting, and poor coaching aren't the culprits...it's that doggone complicated financial ledger that looks different than I am used to seeing's fault.

Again for the hundredth time, the financial stupidity by Loomis isn't what got us to this point but it's not a justified way of doing business when you are a terrible team.

 

[St. Geezy]

Again for the hundredth time, the financial stupidity by Loomis isn't what got us to this point but it's not a justified way of doing business when you are a terrible team.

Were we terrible before the injuries? You’re talking as if you and he knew we’d be a 3-7 team at this juncture. Hindsight is always 20/20.

“Financial stupidity” is harsh.

 

[HouseCall]

BREAKING NEWS: NFL team signs player to a 4 year $150m mega-contract with $100m in guarantees, becomes stuck with him for at least three seasons, faces potential severe cap complications for releasing him before end of contract.

(We’ll just conveniently ignore the fact that said cap strategy enabled us to sign the highest paid free agent of that off-season to said mega contract despite being nearly $100m over the cap going into that year, proving that numbers can indeed be moved when we actively choose to sign free agents).

The Loomis/Hartley cap strategy was designed to keep a competitive roster together under Drew Brees - when year to year we were only a player or two away from staying competitive and contending.

The problem is that the Saints are seeing the negative side effects of that strategy with the lack of quality depth to fill spots.

Look at the number of quality depth we let walk in free agency - not because we didn’t want them but because we couldn’t afford them because of money tied up in prorated and protracted contracts.

Hendrickson, Anzalone, Williams, Ellis, Onyemata - just to name a few. Some of these guys may not have been in the long term plans anyway, but if you miss on a few draft picks and have to tie up a bunch of cap space for voidable year contracts, your depth really suffers.

That’s where we are today.

Talented week 1 team that got picked apart by the injury bug.

 

[St.Dan]

So many concepts in motion right now on 1) who is the head coach 2) the QB and 3) the OC next year. Each of those things is a domino in a process controlled only by Ms. Benson. Does she touch the first domino again in the offseason or does she leave the interim domino alone and let it be permanent?

The post that revived this thread lays out a compelling scenario for moving on from Carr as soon as next year. But right now, I'd still say the odds are that Carr is still around next season. I do feel good about having Rattler already in the building. It's easy to see he has a higher ceiling than Haener. Who will coach him up?

 

[St. Geezy]

The Loomis/Hartley cap strategy was designed to keep a competitive roster together under Drew Brees - when year to year we were only a player or two away from staying competitive and contending.

The problem is that the Saints are seeing the negative side effects of that strategy with the lack of quality depth to fill spots.

Look at the number of quality depth we let walk in free agency - not because we didn’t want them but because we couldn’t afford them because of money tied up in prorated and protracted contracts.

Hendrickson, Anzalone, Williams, Ellis, Onyemata - just to name a few. Some of these guys may not have been in the long term plans anyway, but if you miss on a few draft picks and have to tie up a bunch of cap space for voidable year contracts, your depth really suffers.

That’s where we are today.

Talented week 1 team that got picked apart by the injury bug.

This is your interpretation of what it was designed for, repeated by fans so much that it is now called fact when in reality, all it is is low-hanging fruit for people to pick apart when things aren’t going well.

As Loomis said, this is way overblown. All we are doing is using future dollars instead of present dollars on a continuous clip. The Hendrickson/Williams fiasco was a direct result of COVID. I will admit, we got caught with our pants down there and it was not a foreseen circumstance.

Anzalone isn’t a fair person to name because he didn’t become “quality depth” worth keeping until he left us. None of us batted an eye at losing Anzalone, just like no one batted an eye when we left Baun walk.

Look, we aren’t the only team losing players in free agency, even teams with the so-called “healthy caps” are losing players left and right, and especially backup types like Ellis that want to get starter money. This isn’t some unique Saints problem.

In order to maintain the illusion of a healthy cap, there are still major restrictions and discipline measures you must take that are akin to ours, just in a different form, including not being able to cleanly break away from a 4 year $150 million contract you may now regret after year two without suffering greatly.

Our depth is bad because our player selection, and arguably our player development, has been poor, not because we weren’t able to spend tons of free agency money on depth. What in the world kind of depth do you think these other teams have to where they can withstand the types of injuries we have seen across the board with ease?

Most teams are top heavy, with cheap draft picks and free agents for depth, ours just aren’t working out mostly because of draft whiffs and a POTENTIAL player development gulf, and they certainly aren’t going to work out when half of the depth is on the field all at once; that goes for any team.

We could have done more this off-season if we wanted to, but Loomis said we are intentionally dialing back the strategy some, presumably to gear up for another crack at it later rather than right now, and now that fact is being used by members of the fanbase to say “See, it doesn’t work, we can’t sign anyone now.”

 

[St. Geezy]

We have some really smart people and many cap experts on this forum, so much so that they believe they know more than a NFL GM with an accounting background who says it is no big deal how we operate, as well as a VP of Football Administration with a CPA background that has worked as a NFL contract approval officer and league cap compliance officer also saying what we do doesn’t matter and just is a cosmetic issue.

So with that in mind, this fun exercise shouldn’t be an issue for the experts - What is the absolute maximum amount of cap space the Saints can create this off-season, if they actively choose to, presuming a Jordan and Ramczyk retirement is a part of the equation? And why can’t we do all the things you want to get accomplished that you feel ails our roster with that amount this off-season? Again, the Saints in this scenario have decided not to dial back things intentionally and instead go all-out with this iteration of the roster.

I’ll hang up and listen.

 

[Rouxble]

We have some really smart people and many cap experts on this forum, so much so that they believe they know more than a NFL GM with an accounting background who says it is no big deal how we operate, as well as a VP of Football Administration with a CPA background that has worked as a NFL contract approval officer and league cap compliance officer also saying what we do doesn’t matter and just is a cosmetic issue.

So with that in mind, this fun exercise shouldn’t be an issue for the experts - What is the absolute maximum amount of cap space the Saints can create this off-season, if they actively choose to, presuming a Jordan and Ramczyk retirement is a part of the equation? And why can’t we do all the things you want to get accomplished that you feel ails our roster with that amount this off-season? Again, the Saints in this scenario have decided not to dial back things intentionally and instead go all-out with this iteration of the roster.

I’ll hang up and listen.

Easy, the answer is less space than every other team, just like it was the last two years.

Restructure Potential | Over the Cap

Restructure Potential | Over the Cap

overthecap.com

 

[St. Geezy]

Easy, the answer is less space than every other team, just like it was the last two years.

Restructure Potential | Over the Cap

Restructure Potential | Over the Cap

overthecap.com

And how much space is that? And how much space remains to be able to pull from from the next five seasons? And your analysis only includes restructures to create buying power. We can cut or extend guys to play with the numbers as well.

Man, if the off-season where we went in nearly $100 million over the cap yet signed the league’s highest paid free agent that year wasn’t proof enough that this is all just accounting cosmetics to tinker with, I don’t know what else to say.

We don’t like the players acquired, many of the ones we do like got hurt, and we don’t (didn’t) like the people coaching them…we can’t now turn around and say it was the cap strategy’s fault we are in the mess we’re in.

 

[St. Geezy]

I feel like people are mad because they have this fantasy in their head of blowing the team up, cutting guys left and right, something the organization isn’t really interested in, and people are making themselves angry because the team isn’t set up to do this hypothetical thing the fans want but the team itself doesn’t and as a result hasn’t aligned themselves for it.

And really, most teams aren’t set up to just cut key members of their roster without severely crippling their so-called healthy cap, especially not a $150m QB in the midst of year two.

It’s a 5 year accounting book guys; we can move numbers around. We just need to be better at bringing in the right coaches, and the right players, mainly from the draft (and keep them healthy), and suddenly all will be right again.

 

[Rouxble]

And how much space is that? And how much space remains to be able to pull from from the next five seasons? And your analysis only includes restructures to create buying power. We can cut or extend guys to play with the numbers as well.

Man, if the off-season where we went in nearly $100 million over the cap yet signed the league’s highest paid free agent that year wasn’t proof enough that this is all just accounting cosmetics to tinker with, I don’t know what else to say.

We don’t like the players acquired, many of the ones we do like got hurt, and we don’t like the people coaching them…we can’t now turn around and say it was the cap strategy’s fault.

The Saints can create $115m in space by restructuring every penny possible and adding void years to max out the benefit, which puts us last compared to every other team if they decided to do the same:



That chart assumes each team either (a) restructures without adding void years or (b) does a max restructure that adds void years to spread the cap hit over five years. It's not hard to expect us to have less room to push into future years than other teams because we have already borrowed so much from future years. Quoting the article that @baarbogast posted:

How excessive is the Saints use of restructures? From 2020 to 2024 they have ranked no lower than 2nd in a given year in the amount of salary converted to a bonus for salary cap purposes. Over the entire term no team is even in the same ballpark as New Orleans. The Saints have restructured around $450 million to create nearly $340 million in cap space over that timeframe. The amount converted is a staggering $254 million more than the next closest team. They have “created” $182 million more in cap room than the next closest team. In recent years they have had to restructure almost every eligible contract to function. They are up to nearly 50 restructures, almost 25 more than the next closest team and that does not even count a few players who were extended in large part to lower their cap hits.

Any extensions aren't likely to add more space than a restructure because they will likely come with new money. Also, due to all the restructuring, we have few (if any) contracts that will benefit more from a release than a restructure due to dead money.

Even leaving those points out, other teams would have the same (and likely better) options due to less dead money on the books.

 

[St. Geezy]

The Saints can create $115m in space by restructuring every penny possible and adding void years to max out the benefit, which puts us last compared to every other team if they decided to do the same:



That chart assumes each team either (a) restructures without adding void years or (b) does a max restructure that adds void years to spread the cap hit over five years. It's not hard to expect us to have less room to push into future years than other teams because we have already borrowed so much from future years. Quoting the article that @baarbogast posted:



Any extensions aren't likely to add more space than a restructure because they will likely come with new money. Also, due to all the restructuring, we have few (if any) contracts that will benefit more from a release than a restructure due to dead money.

Even leaving those points out, other teams would have the same (and likely better) options due to less dead money on the books.

Who cares if it is “Last.” It is $115 million dollars, meaning we can create space whenever we need to in order to realistically handle needs, and being “Last” doesn’t mean anything also because most of the league isn’t going to do this hypothetical thing, so that point to me is moot.

Whether we want to spend it or not is the question. The cap is just not the hinderance it is being made out to be. As Loomis says, it’s way overblown.

My point in all of this is to demonstrate that we can create money if we want to create money. Stop staring at the one year outlook with the negative cap space going into each off-season before we process what we want to process.

 

[Rouxble]

Here is also the chart for this year. It assumes a team either does a max restructure or cut, whichever creates the most space, and the Saints are last in 2024. It is fiction that we can create whatever space we want:



The Saints haven't found some hidden strategy that no other team knows about, other teams just value flexibility more.

 

[Rouxble]

Who cares if it is “Last.” It is $115 million dollars, meaning we can create space whenever we need to in order to realistically handle needs, and being “Last” doesn’t mean anything also because most of the league isn’t going to do this hypothetical thing, so that point to me is moot.

Whether we want to spend it or not is the question. The cap is just not the hinderance it is being made out to be. As Loomis says, it’s way overblown.

The claim is made that the cap doesn't limit us, but we are limited more than every other team, that is the why it matters who is last. I've pointed out in another thread that we are 25th in actual spending despite having the least cap space available, that illustrates the limitation more than anything else.

Also, most of the league isn't doing that hypothetical thing because they don't need to, and they value the flexibility that not being loaded down with dead money affords a team. The strategy is what it is, but without a doubt the cap creates constraints on teams. We've let enough players leave for mid-tier contracts to see them flourish on other teams while we've signed cheaper "upgrades" that everyone wants to show the door.

 

[St. Geezy]

The claim is made that the cap doesn't limit us, but we are limited more than every other team, that is the why it matters who is last. I've pointed out in another thread that we are 25th in actual spending despite having the least cap space available, that illustrates the limitation more than anything else.

Also, most of the league isn't doing that hypothetical thing because they don't need to, and they value the flexibility that not being loaded down with dead money affords a team. The strategy is what it is, but without a doubt the cap creates constraints on teams. We've let enough players leave for mid-tier contracts to see them flourish on other teams while we've signed cheaper "upgrades" that everyone wants to show the door.

There we go again…using the team’s intentional decision to roll things back against them. You ignore that conveniently when saying we are 25th in spending.

No one has claimed we have found some hidden strategy. My claim is actually the opposite…it doesn’t matter (at least not to the doom and gloom degree most people here make it out to be). We aren’t doing some egregious thing; we just manage our books differently with different looking consequences that mirror everyone else’s end result when you don’t pick the right people.

And again, we aren’t the only team losing free agents; everyone does, including teams that have $50m-plus of cap space every offseason.

Cap space isn’t some magic pill to end all ails. Some of the worst teams in the league have the most cap space annually.

Too many people are confusing “Flat out poor or regrettable personnel decisions” with cap restrictions.