What if that player suffers a season or career ending injury in the preseason or early in the regular season, e.g. Nate Odomes? What if he’s not the player he was on his previous team, e.g. Nnamdi Asomugha? What if he puts in zero effort after you give him a huge contract, e.g. Albert Haynesworth? What if he was never really that great to begin with, e.g. Antonio Bryant?
Point is, it’s pretty much always a better idea to back-load contracts, so you can at least see what you’re getting before you lay out the serious cash. Look at Haynesworth: the Redskins “illegally” front-loaded his contract (and then the league bitch-slapped them for it, but that’s a separate issue entirely), he was a shit player for them, and they paid him $21 million to go away (on top of the $15 million they had already paid him).
Kruger got a $6 million signing bonus, and a $6.285 million roster bonus for 2013. His 2013 base salary is only $715,000. I don’t know if there’s any cap advantage to structuring the bulk of the first year salary as a roster bonus as opposed to just paying him $7 million in base salary (which he’s getting in 2014 guaranteed), but the roster bonus doesn’t get prorated over the contract for cap purposes.
Kruger’s deal is essentially 2 years, $20 million. 3rd year will probably happen, after that who knows.
Didn’t they just use their first round draft pick from last year on Reilly Reiff, a LT from Iowa. He was their 6th lineman last year, I imagine they think he’ll take over this year.
Backloading doesn’t really work in the NFL. It’s impossible to know what your team is going to look like in 4 years. You have to have the flexibility to cut guys in order to pay other guys. The players know this, so a coveted free agent would never agree to a backloaded deal. Nobody was going to sign Haynesworth unless he got high guarantees, which he did, and even though it was officially a 7 year deal, everybody involved knew it was going a max of 4 before it was renegotiated or he was released.
Losing as many good players as the Ravens have is never good. They were cap heavy and couldn’t keep some guys like Ellerbee that I am sure they would rather have. Their defense is in serious flux. I wouldn’t count on a “plug and play” philosophy with them now that Stabbing Ray is gone, Ed Reed is ancient and many of their good players have bolted.
Boldin only has a couple years left, but the Rats losing him is a big deal. Now they have to search or promote someone that can take Boldin’s job, ie, take heat off Torrey Smith,their only viable deep threat.
I agree and with the return of Mohammed Sanu and additions through the draft, the Bengalis will put this “Dalton doesn’t have an arm” nonsense to rest forever.
Is he Shawn Kemp’s cousin?
And I’d love to see Jackson in a Bengals uni. He’s the guy they passed over to draft Chris Perry. Perhaps karma will work in the Bengals favor for once.
Flacco never won anything before this season and was perenially throwing to 2nd and 3rd targets. There’s a reason Ray Rice was their leading receiver up until this season. It’s because Flacco really isn’t all that great.
Yep.
Cribbs is no longer the threat he used to be, and I do not think its because of the adjusted kickoffs, either. And he failed epically as a WR. He’s a decent player now, but I think the Brownies were wise to cut that cord. He’s aging and not as effective as he used to be.
There are no guarantees that the Ravens defense will EVER be the same.
Roster bonuses affect only the current year, signing bonuses are prorated. A great example of what you’re talking about is the Broncos contract for Peyton Manning. He has an incredibly high salary and it’s fully guaranteed unless his neck injury costs him time. But none of it is guaranteed beyond the current season so cutting him wouldn’t cause any dead money on the back end.
I completely disagree. Backloading a contract is how teams cripple themselves and push up against the cap for years without the player being on the team. Look at Dallas. Dallas is a perfect example of how NOT to manage the cap. They constantly push bonuses back, restructuring contracts and pushing money back and they’re up against the cap every year because of it. This story will be ongoing for years because of this mess.
Teams want to backload because it frees up money now. GMs and Presidents want to free up money now to win now, because their jobs are on the line if they don’t. The less money you pay one player now, the more you can pay for other (better) players, now. Players want to frontload contracts because they want money now. They can get hurt anytime and lose their jobs. They want as much guaranteed, as much up front, as they can get. This is the basic dynamic between teams and players.
It does seem like a team who wants to take advantage of a lot of cap room right now could match interests with a player who wants a ton of money now. Maybe the agents try to keep players from doing this to prevent them from playing for basically nothing in the future. Another thing to think about is that a team can roll cap room over from one season to the next (like the Eagles did last season to this season). I actually have no idea how this works or what the mechanics are, but there’s one possible reason not to burn up cap room.
Bennett is quite the character. I just watched an interview where he’s talking about a book he’s writing titled Astronauts, Dinosaurs, and Cupcakes. The other stuff I’ve heard him talk about includes his love of dinosaurs, Harry Potter, and why he’s the Black Unicorn. Also, he likes to block.
Long passed his physical on Wednesday. I wonder what is taking the Rams so long to get a deal done with him. They have been “hammering out the deal” for over 24 hrs.
One of the clips I heard was him explaining bein The Black Unicorn. Paraphrasing, he said something like: “I’m the Black Unicorn because I’m Black and Amazing. I realized I was amazing when I was 8, and found out I was Black when I was 24”.
Dude is hilarious. And, apparently, an Renaissance kinda guy. I’m glad that Lovie is no longer there to stomp out every ounce of personality and talkativeness of his players.
NFL teams pay out about a third of the contract as a roster bonus on day 1 as it is, but the salary cap rules amortize the roster bonus over the length of the contract. But even if you cut the player, you still get the cap hit. So if you’ve got the cap hit now, why not turn part of the signing bonus into first year salary or roster bonus to take effect like a day after the signing?
From the next post, I guess that sounds kinda like what they did with Kruger, so I guess teams do do it. I just hear about it so rarely I thought it was odd cap management. Like people who always make bad debt decisions to have more now.
I don’t think roster bonuses are prorated over the life of the contract. They count against the cap in the year they are paid. The benefit to structuring the first year as a roster bonus is a concession to the player who wants his $6M today instead of in 16 payments over the course of the season.
That’s what I figured. In 5 months time, he’ll have gotten paid $12 million. He can have a new house and four stupid rides in his garage by the time the season starts.
Well, the Bears lost one important player in Nick Roach who just signed with the Raiders for a nice little bump in pay from $2.5M/year to $4. Exact numbers aren’t yet available. Roach isn’t a difference maker, but he was versatile and could play all three LB spots and was the secondary option of Urlacher doesn’t come back. This combined with the loss of Geno Hayes to the Jags leaves the Bears pretty desperate at LB with little money to spend.
Frankly this pisses me off. Not Roach leaving, he needed to cash in at least once in his career and he’s replaceable, but Lovie and Co. leaving this team so damn deficient at LB. For years and years they kept treating the backup LBs as unnecessary while signing a bunch of Special Teams players who have a token LB designation to inflated contracts. Each time a starter went down the D took a massive step back and now that guys are leaving the cupboard is bare without even a hint of a guy who can step up.
The Bears will be counting on untested 3rd year guy JT Thomas and if Urlacher retires it’s Dom fucking DiCicco in the middle. Yikes. Starting to pine for Ogletree in the draft over a WR or OG.
The Bears also locked up Nick Collins in the wake of cutting Toeaina which is the right move, Collins is better than Toeaina and cheaper. Still need another body or two there, but with Melton, Collins, Paea back we’ve got a solid rotation. Personally I’d like to have Akoye back at the same price as Collins, but I not sure if that’s possible.
Speaking of the draft, just to get it in writing, I think Sheriff Floyd is the best player in this draft. I love Fisher and Joeckel and Ansah and Lotulelei are interesting, but Floyd would be my no brainer pick if I were the Chiefs.
Now that the Bears have signed a OT and TE, the top projections for them at #20 are Tavon Austin, Alec Ogletree or one of the OGs. I’m guessing the OGs are both gone rendering that moot. Ogletree would solve a ton of problems and he’s got top 10 talent, what I know now about his off-the-field issues don’t scare me, but between Minter and Brown there’s a decent shot a worthy guy will fall to them in round 2. That leaves Tavon Austin as the pick if he’s available. I really dislike mighty mouse type players and they usually bust but the Austin buzz and the possibility of using him out of the backfield are wearing me down.
Guess he’s stupidly and stubbornly sticking to that $11M/year demand. Not sure where else he’s going to get it from, starting to feel a bit better about the Bears grabbing Bushrod and avoiding this song and dance. Even if Long is a better player, Bushrod seem like a better value and the quick agreement at least freed them to make other moves.
Like this one…Zack Bowman will be back with the Bears. Another good move, he’s young, dynamic and never seemed to be a great fit in Lovie’s system but might be better utilized in Tucker’s. At the very least he’s a gem on special team with the upside of being an experienced backup CB. Wonder if he’ll get a chance to compete at Nickel.
The Broncos release Elvis Dumervil in bizarre contact snafu. They had negotiated a pay cut prior to Dumervil’s 12 million dollar contract becoming guarantied at 4pm (eastern) but Elvis’ agent didn’t fax the new contract until 4:07. So to avoid being on the hook for 12 mill guarantied they had to cut him. I assume he’ll just resign but might be tempted to test the market first.