Team Friendly Deals

[*ochocincos*]

If you look through the contracts across the teams that consistently make the playoffs, you'll see the following pattern:
On offense...
Pay good money (typically $7+ mill) for all of QB, WR1, 2 OL, 2nd offensive weapon

On defense...
Pay good money for 2 DBs, 2 DL, 1 LB (or 3rd DL)

The team must then fill out the rest of the roster with players on rookie contracts, bargain FAs, and/or cheaper depth players. Typically, none of these remaining players makes more than $6 million a year.

For the Bengals, their big money for 2016 went to the following:
offense = Dalton, Green, Eifert, Whitworth, Zeitler
defense = Atkins, Jones, Kirkpatrick, Dunlap, Johnson

If Whitworth, Zeitler, and Kirkpatrick are re-signed, you're looking at the same top 10 paid players. The only one out of those that really isn't worth the money is MJ, but Burfict could very well become that 5th highest paid defensive player after this coming season.