The Eagles areprojected to have almost $20 million in cap room even** after** the Desean Jackson tag.
Now, I don’t know how much resigning Evan Mathis (as in, Pro Football Focus’s best Guard in the NFL Evan Mathis) will cost, but it’s a priority. He started 15 games and gave up zero sacks and committed zero penalties. And Pro Football Focus graded him almost three times better at run blocking than the next best Guard in the NFL (Carl Nicks). He’s quickly becoming my favorite player, I hope they keep him. He and Derek Landri are the only guys I would really hate to lose. Everyone else is signed or a bench/rotation player. The Eagles are in pretty good shape to make another big move.
They’ll need to make a bunch of big signings for the bench if they hope to top last year’s record of six* wins by the second team. :dubious:
I am confused, not like that feeling is unusual when discussing the NFL salary cap though. I went to the site you linked—great one too, BTW. Would that all teams had something similar. And I looked at their detailed breakout for the Eagles salary cap. They list the projected 2012 cap at $122M, and the Eagles’s cap total at $119.8M. You only get the $20M in room if you apply the line item, “Cap adjustments: $19M.” My question is: where does that cap adjustments figure come from? Because my first thought when you made your post was similar to Omni’s.
What he is is one of the worst starting LT’s in the league. That’s not to say he couldn’t, given his athleticism, develop into a passable LT in time. But I, for one, would be thrilled if he was the starting tackle for the Bears next year too.
That line is much better at run blocking that pass blocking, which isn’t saying much because they’re one of the league’s worst in pass blocking. And don’t let me talk any of the Bears or Bears fans out of sticking with Webb, Louis, Garza, and the rest. I like that O Line just the way it was.
I don’t get this about Mathis. When he was with Cincinnati, he couldn’t get playing time ahead of the absolutely horrible Nate Livings, even though in spot duty it was clear he was the better player. There were a lot of rumors that he was a locker room/attitude problem guy and now he’s the best o-lineman the Eagles have. It figures.
They make liberal use of what are known as “Likely to be earned” cap numbers. Basically, you pay a guy against the cap this year for some incentive clause, he doesn’t actually earn the bonus, and then you push the number you paid into the next year’s cap.
Made up example: say they put a clause in Vick’s contract that he gets 2.5 million for throwing 20 touchdowns and 2.5 million for completing 60% of his passes. He did both of those things in 2010, so for 2011 cap purposes they were “likely to be earned” again, which means they count against the cap immediately. Vick didn’t do either in 2011, so he didn’t earn that 5 million, so the 2011 cap number was 5 million too high.
Thus your adjustment: 5 million more for the 2012 cap.
In other news, the NFL has said that the New Orleans Saints had instituted a “bounty program” which monetarily awarded players for injuring players on the opposing team. The Saints could lose draft picks, be heavily fined, and have Payton suspended. (Gregg Williams, the DC, is now with the Rams). No word yet on the actual punishment.
Beyond that, it’s an incredibly shitty thing to do. Any respect I had, or good feelings for their post-Katrina wins, has now disappeared. Fuck Gregg Williams, fuck Sean Payton, and fuck the New Orleans Saints.
The Saints are going to lose so much more than the one first round pick the Patriots lost. Given that the payments were largely paid for by the players, suspensions are likely coming, too.
This has been answered within the thread, but I’d also like to point out that the Eagles are the kings of the NFL when it comes to managing the cap. They spent several years preparing every player’s contracts to open up the maximum amount of space for last season, and because they did have so many young players playing starting positions (arguably one of the reasons they didn’t actually win anything, mind), they have a ton of cap space nearly every season.
A lot of semi expensive vets who aren’t starting (Winston Justice, Juqua Parker, etc.) are also coming off the cap, potentially freeing up room this season. They’ve done this for years, letting older vets go a season before they go into decline.
I’m trying to avoid a cheap shot here, but it doesn’t surprise me at all that he was completely overlooked in Cincinnati, where it kinda seems like they don’t know what they’re doing.
I can’t imagine him being a locker room problem, either, at least assuming his public persona is anywhere close to his actual personality. I think he was getting screwed in Cincy and probably didn’t take too well to it. My guess at least. He always had the innate talent, according to scouts, but he’s tailor-made for the Eagles scheme with Howard Mudd coaching the O-Line. Entering the perfect situation had as much to do with his breakout as being ignored in Cincinnati did. Between Mathis and Peters, the Eagles’ left side of the line is so far and away better than any other team’s it’s crazy. I’d say Peters is the best LT in the NFL.
I guess I should amend that by saying “In 2011, between Mathis and Peters…” since I’ll get called out for making predictions about 2012 in the preseason.
I wanted to throw this out there, too. When the Patriots were caught video taping, one of the defenses tossed about was that everyone does it, only the Patriots got caught. In light of this bounty scandal, how common do you all think this is within the league?
I suspect there is encouragement, tacit or otherwise, to knock opposing players out. Whether other teams have organized it the way the Saints did or were monumentally stupid enough to write any of it down the way they did is anyone’s guess.
Anyway, I’m not sure its a case of Cincinnati “not knowing what it is doing”. By all accounts they have average to above average coaches. And Cincinnati has made the playoffs twice in the last three seasons, and are on the cusp of being a perennially young, talented winning team. And they have extra draft picks and tons of cap space. Not a dim future for a team that (barely) made the playoffs last season.
Sooo…yeah on Mathis. But sometimes that just happens when a player moves from one situation to another…its funny because the exact opposite thing happened between our two teams in the form of Stacy Andrews. He was a project for us, was never really all that great as a starter, we ended up tagging him anyway but he wanted a huge contract which the Bengals wouldn’t give him after his injury, then he signed for big money with the Eagles and was a bust compared to his contract. His brother was always a better player than him but a headcase.
Damn. I’m a St. Louis guy and the Rams can’t fire Williams fast enough to make me happy. I hope the league comes down hard and heavy on this. It should mostly hit management, but if they can follow the money and figure out which players accepted payment, those guys should suffer too.
The other thing about the bounty system is that it seems like paltry amounts, rewarding $500-1500. How much can that possibly matter when even the guys with the small contracts are making $500k+ per year?
It sounds like the money was collected from the players as fines for minor infractions, like being late for meetings or whatnot. WAG I’d imagine this was probably collected in cash, and who doesn’t like being showered with bills, especially if it’s (I’m guessing) presented in front of your teammates?
