salary cap hell! (1 Viewer)

[guillermo]

There is no question that starting the year so over the cap reduce our range of manouvering.

And another point, does the 49ers roster justify having cap. Issues? Absolutely!

Does this current roster justifies our cap situation? I don’t think so.

 

[Rouxble]

The Super Bowl team with arguably the best QB in football, who has already been paid, has $100m more in cap space than us going into 2024 before any restructures. We need to create $100m worth of dead money through restructures just to match their spending capacity, which puts us back in the cycle for 2025. Mahomes is not tremendously underpaid either, his AAV for the rest of his contract (including 2023) is $45m/yr. It's not going to take a big change in their strategy if they need to get him above Burrow next year (>$55m/yr).

Loomis said in an interview that we would do some belt tightening this year, it will be interesting to see if he follows through with it.

 

[saintsmarchin]

whats a salary cap?

 

[Stalwart385]

Funny how people can look at a situation and see it different ways. Even when the situation is pretty clear cut. Most people look at the picture and see a man riding a bike. Others see the picture and tell us that it's actually a bike with a man on top. They aren't wrong technically but they know they aren't right.

People are just trained to look at money a certain way. This isn't ain't that. Everyone is doing it more and more and for good reason.

 

[Rouxble]

You are limited to two post-June 1 transactions per year. That limits them.

Carr's cap number was $7.2 million in 2024 and now we have to deal with it because his 2025 cap number is $35.7 million. Mathieu and Maye were both less than $3.5 million on the first year cap and are ballooning now. Maye, who we don't need anymore, will cost $8.4 million in dead money to cut because of 3 void years because most of his contract was more guaranteed prorated bonuses than salary. If Ram were to retire tomorrow, we'd have $32 million in dead money.

Like I said, we are limited by the back loaded and constantly restructured contracts. The salaries balloon at the end and we can't cut them because if we did the void year bonuses would accelerate and cost more than another restructure.

Also, even if you designate a player a June 1 cut you have to carry their full cap hit until June 1. You can't use the designation as a tool to get under the cap before the league year starts, or to clear space to sign free agents after the league year starts.

 

[Boy_of_wonder75]

I would've written it, "Salary cap? Hell!"

 

[BreesusSaves]

The Super Bowl team with arguably the best QB in football, who has already been paid, has $100m more in cap space than us going into 2024 before any restructures. We need to create $100m worth of dead money through restructures just to match their spending capacity, which puts us back in the cycle for 2025. Mahomes is not tremendously underpaid either, his AAV for the rest of his contract (including 2023) is $45m/yr. It's not going to take a big change in their strategy if they need to get him above Burrow next year (>$55m/yr).

Loomis said in an interview that we would do some belt tightening this year, it will be interesting to see if he follows through with it.

To add on to this...

Per OTC, extending Mahomes to make him the highest paid QB in the league could potentially free up $34.6m in 2024. A simple restructure for Juwaan Taylor frees up $12.5m. So that would put the Chiefs with an estimated $71.1m in free cap space for 2024... coming directly off a Super Bowl appearance AND making Mahomes the highest paid QB in the league.

Let's look at the top two teams in the NFC...

The 49ers are $3.7m over the cap. Restructuring their top five cap hits frees up $61.4m, leaving them with $57.7m in cap space.

The Lions have $47.6m in cap space. Extending Goff frees $20m. Restructuring their next four frees another $21m in cap space. That puts the Lions at $88.6m in cap space, and they can free more if they want to, they can have over $100m in cap space if they want, although I don't think they will.

Meanwhile the Saints after SonofNOLA's linked cap maneuvers will have approximately $9.2m in cap space.

The Saints haven't won their division or been to the playoffs in three consecutive seasons. In that same stretch, the 49ers have been to three straight NFC Championship games and the Chiefs have been to six straight AFC Championship games.

 

[TurboWhoDat]

Cap hell isn't a myth because what people mean by cap hell isn't defined. Getting under the cap isn't the question. We always do that. We may even be able to sign a player or two to back loaded contracts. So if by cap hell you mean we can't get under the cap, then we're not in cap hell.

To me cap hell means that our roster is limited by how we manage the cap. How many of those players you listed do you really want to restructure or re-sign? For me, it would only be McCoy and Granderson and maybe Ruiz. The rest I don't want to push more money out to get bitten by their drop-offs or retirements and not be able to move off of them because of the cap. The jury is out on Carr and you certainly don't want to guarantee him more money. Ramczyk has a major knee condition and I wouldn't want to guarantee him more either. Demario and Cam are really old for their positions and are near retirement. AK is approaching RB dropoff age and Taysom is already beyond it. We will be sitting on dead money for those players beyond their playing years because we are running out of younger players to restructure.

So what you consider cap hell and what I consider cap hell are quite different.

this exactly x 1000. i know for many it feels good to think that this approach to cap mgmt is some kind of big brain move and we're the only team smart enough to do it. to that i would argue, if this were a smart strategy everyone in the league would be doing it. also, we would be a in the playoffs every year. this does not benefit the team in any way. and honestly, it wasn't even that smart when we had brees though it made a little more sense at the time. the hurdle of managing drew's contract should have pushed loomis to put more emphasis on drafting and free agency instead of this reckless approach to cap mgmt.

 

[St. Geezy]

To add on to this...

Per OTC, extending Mahomes to make him the highest paid QB in the league could potentially free up $34.6m in 2024. A simple restructure for Juwaan Taylor frees up $12.5m. So that would put the Chiefs with an estimated $71.1m in free cap space for 2024... coming directly off a Super Bowl appearance AND making Mahomes the highest paid QB in the league.

Let's look at the top two teams in the NFC...

The 49ers are $3.7m over the cap. Restructuring their top five cap hits frees up $61.4m, leaving them with $57.7m in cap space.

The Lions have $47.6m in cap space. Extending Goff frees $20m. Restructuring their next four frees another $21m in cap space. That puts the Lions at $88.6m in cap space, and they can free more if they want to, they can have over $100m in cap space if they want, although I don't think they will.

Meanwhile the Saints after SonofNOLA's linked cap maneuvers will have approximately $9.2m in cap space.

The Saints haven't won their division or been to the playoffs in three consecutive seasons. In that same stretch, the 49ers have been to three straight NFC Championship games and the Chiefs have been to six straight AFC Championship games.

Drafting well, not striking out on free agent signings, and having a great head coach pays dividends. Who knew?

Once again, the cap management style is not the problem or the solution. Player evaluation and coaching is. If we had signed the right players using the same money and drafted better, not to mention held onto our great HC, we would be in the same situation those teams are in.

You can’t manipulate the cap and sign who we want and extend who we want while also drafting poorly then turn around say the team is bad because of its cap situation.

This system has allowed us to spend a lot of money, we just aren’t spending it properly.

 

[rlemieux]

Salary cap hell is a myth. It’s really not hard at all for the FO to clear 83 million plus additional cap space. The restructures are preplanned every year. Might not be a preferred position to be in but it comes with
re-signing many great players to maintain a good team and attractive destination.

It’s not a myth. Just because you can restructure deals, it still limits what can be done. Trey Hendrickson, Marcus Williams, Mark Ingram the first time. We’re projected to be 80 million over the cap. Even after all those restructures they only gives us 10 million in space. This is a strategy that made since when Drew was the QB, even then it had huge restrictions but now it’s just asinine. To keep pushing salaries further and further out to fuel a window that is closed isn’t conducive to the modern NFL. We are almost always top 2-3 in money over the cap and we haven’t competed for several years now.

 

[saint_drago]

I hate the argument that we are in this situation because that is the cost of keeping all-pro players. That is just incorrect.

We had two pro-bowlers that made the team as replacements. We are not in this situation because we have a supremely talented roster which is why this method is dumb.

We are in this situation because of mismanagement during the Brees era that they tried to correct but it snowballed into out of control territory.

We are in cap hell because we are average/below average and everyone else in the league has more flexability than us to get better. Regardless of how you feel about doing it when you have the worst cap situation in the league it limits you the most.

This is it. People act like starting each offseason 60-100 million over the cap isn't hurting the team at all. Some even take it a step further and suggest that it's genius. Loomis and Harley are just ahead of the curve. Harley is just so brilliant that he does what others simply can't.

I just don't get it. I used to get it. I got it when it made sense. I was a huge proponent of going all in while we had the best QB and coach in franchise history. We only had so many years with those two together so of course you move heaven and earth to win now. The future didn't matter. All that mattered was that season. But then Jameis Winston of all people became our starting QB and SP pulled the eject lever and bailed. It started making less since then. Much less.

And it's not just the cap shenanigans. A big part of the all in approach has been trading away draft picks to move up and get players who can make an immediate impact. I figured that would fall by the wayside too when Drew finally hung them up. Figured they would get it together and rebuild. So what do they do? Immediately sell the farm for a WR. They let the draft come to them last year so I'm hoping they have course corrected on their draft strategy at least.

 

[Stalwart385]

This is it. People act like starting each offseason 60-100 million over the cap isn't hurting the team at all. Some even take it a step further and suggest that it's genius. Loomis and Harley are just ahead of the curve. Harley is just so brilliant that he does what others simply can't.

I just don't get it. I used to get it. I got it when it made sense. I was a huge proponent of going all in while we had the best QB and coach in franchise history. We only had so many years with those two together so of course you move heaven and earth to win now. The future didn't matter. All that mattered was that season. But then Jameis Winston of all people became our starting QB and SP pulled the eject lever and bailed. It started making less since then. Much less.

And it's not just the cap shenanigans. A big part of the all in approach has been trading away draft picks to move up and get players who can make an immediate impact. I figured that would fall by the wayside too when Drew finally hung them up. Figured they would get it together and rebuild. So what do they do? Immediately sell the farm for a WR. They let the draft come to them last year so I'm hoping they have course corrected on their draft strategy at least.

The strategy is an edge. It won't win games itself though. There are drawbacks. They are insignificant in moderation (and you must have a willing owner to constantly cut checks) but we got too deep because of Covid, not because a SB push. We won't clear those Covid contracts for another couple of years.

 

[St. Geezy]

It’s not a myth. Just because you can restructure deals, it still limits what can be done. Trey Hendrickson, Marcus Williams, Mark Ingram the first time. We’re projected to be 80 million over the cap. Even after all those restructures they only gives us 10 million in space. This is a strategy that made since when Drew was the QB, even then it had huge restrictions but now it’s just asinine. To keep pushing salaries further and further out to fuel a window that is closed isn’t conducive to the modern NFL. We are almost always top 2-3 in money over the cap and we haven’t competed for several years now.

Always the Hendrickson and Williams examples. Always the only go-to options for these debates while totally ignoring what happened that off-season to derail things (cap space being reduced, hitting us hard unexpectedly at the exact wrong time with our 2017 class up for deals. Let’s not also forget that Hendrickson to that point was injury prone and had only one good year under his belt while Davenport was appearing ready to finally step up).

Aside from that 2020 anomaly, we have kept just about everyone we wanted to keep except maybe Armstead, but even he was a frequent injury situation that we didn’t want to invest further into.

Also, “Ingram the first time” easily could have been re-signed; we simply elected not to as we felt Murray gave us better value for our dollars.

You can’t draft as poorly as we have and whiffed on free agents the way we have (not to mention whiffing on coaching personnel) then turn around and blame the finance situation for our problems.

 

[syracuse saint]

It's a myth to the extent that is tied to the existence of the NFL and the New Orleans Saints are part of the league. I come from the same professional background as Mickey, so I understand his thought process.

If the NFL and the Saints exist forever then no worries. However, if either of those organizations cease to exist, then there will be hell to pay. What will happen is that the organization known as the New Orleans Saints will be paying out salaries in years that they will have no revenue stream to support them.

Mickey has thought about this, I'm sure, and understands this concept. Big corporations do this with tax loopholes and revenue and expense recognition. He took a concept that he learned in the Corporate world and is using it in the NFL.

Mickey, if you are reading this forum and you need a sharp financial analyst with 30 years experience, just message me!

 

[BigDSaintsFan]

I will admit I don't understand all of the ins and outs of the salary cap so question for the cap gurus - how would we get under the cap this year without doing any restructures?