"Salary cap crunch"

[SErebel11]

(03-05-2021, 05:35 PM)Au165 Wrote: I guess we will see. I think your assumption a guy would play for the vet minimum just because he got the signing bonus that year is a bit of a reach. I also think you are crazy to think teams are going to take on so much back-loaded money, they are kind of seeing the fallout of that very thing this year. I could potentially see teams try the voidable year approach where it is basically a 3 year deal with two years voided to spread large signing bonuses out, but I get the feeling the NFL may crack down on this. 

Unless I am mistaking when a player restructures their deal to help the team, the player gets salary turned into bonus money and generally has enough leverage to get some more guaranteed money out of the team in some cases. I could be completely wrong but I do feel like for a team like the Bengals and other teams, it could make a lot of sense to backload a couple of midtier free agents. A guy like Zeitler is a better bet due to his history and position but I also feel like if 9M for 3 seasons is the number then that might be a bit rich. It would make more sense for a guy like Gabe Jackson if his best offers are 1yr/5-6 M to go 2 years and guarantee both with a bonus spread out. Sure there is some risk there but it isn't much different than some of these teams having to restructure multiple deals just to get under this years cap and kicking the can down the road. I would argue that this is a better way just because you would likely be closer to paying what the actual and current market value for the player is.

I think players like Jurrell Casey, Suh, etc looking for 1yr/8-10 million are the ones the will struggle the most because that is dollar to dollar cap hit for the team signing them. But again I could be incorrect.