Dead Weight

[J24]

Peko is a free agent so they don't have to sign him. However they should cut Rey M, V Rey, Pat Sims, and Pacman Jones and that would save them nearly 14 mil in cap room with only 1 mil in dead money. By the way the rookie cap should be around 5,115,000.

[Derrick]

(02-28-2017, 02:08 PM)THE PISTONS Wrote: The only thing I can figure is he's subtracting out rollover space that we carried forward from not spending at the cap as that isn't recurring.


We have about $44.5 cap space.
- $6.5 million that we rolled over. (In reality this can be used for signing bonuses, etc. and the cap should keep rising each year.)
-------------------------------------------
$38 million
-9.2 million - Our rookie pool is around $9.2 million. (https://overthecap.com/draft/)
--------------------------------------------
$28.8 million
Plus, if they waive guys like Maualuga, Jones, MJ...we could have even more.

WHAT??? Get rid of under performing, highly paid, old players? How dare you.

[bengals67]

How in the world do they really only have $15 million in cap space.

I do not believe it, sorry.

And the other point- why do they keep below average players long after they are exposed as below average- Peko, Rey M and Bodine as exhibits A, B, and C

was pacman anything other than an average corner last year? Why keep him after his out of control conduct following many other examples that have not resulted in any changes in judgment or maturity?

Steelers are so much better run than Bengals and they are also a family owned enterprise.

It is really embarrassing.

Here is the game plan- lots of rookies or second and third year players on roster because of cheap contracts and very few if any first or second year players will get any PT.

1990s all over again until they can move when lease expires. there will be little fan base left when this occurs.

[fredtoast]

(02-28-2017, 07:25 PM)Housh Wrote: The team lies to our faces about wanting to win at all costs and people like you would rather back their strategy up than call it out

So let me get this straight.  

You don't agree with the way the bengals are trying to win.  Since you know eactly hwo to win in the NFL and it is impossible for you to ever be wrong the only possible way anyone can disagree with you is if they do not want to win.

Wow, you have a pretty high opinion of yourself, don't you.

BTW since it is impossible for you to be wrong about your theory on how to win in the NFL why aren't you making millions of dollars running an NFL team?

[JumboTron]

(02-28-2017, 09:54 PM)fredtoast Wrote: So let me get this straight.  

You don't agree with the way the bengals are trying to win.  Since you know eactly hwo to win in the NFL and it is impossible for you to ever be wrong the only possible way anyone can disagree with you is if they do not want to win.

Wow, you have a pretty high opinion of yourself, don't you.

BTW since it is impossible for you to be wrong about your theory on how to win in the NFL why aren't you making millions of dollars running an NFL team?

Well to be fair Housh has won just about as many postseason games as Brown, Tobin and Lewis.  So it's not as wide of a gulf as you would think.

[fredtoast]

(02-28-2017, 10:13 PM)JumboTron Wrote: Well to be fair Housh has won just about as many postseason games as Brown, Tobin and Lewis.  So it's not as wide of a gulf as you would think.

Brilliant logic Jumbo.

Makes you feel special to tell people you are just as good of a QB as Andy Dalton, right?

[JumboTron]

(02-28-2017, 10:18 PM)fredtoast Wrote: Brilliant logic Jumbo.

Makes you feel special to tell people you are just as good of a QB as Andy Dalton, right?

You tried fred, you really did.

[jowczarski]

A lot to unpack here.

The Pistons, who did the quick math down to about $28 is on the right path. Add likely RFA tender T.J. Johnson ($1.9M), the practice squad ($1.3M) and the widely recognized injury protection pool (roughly $5M) you're looking in the area of about $16-20 the club is looking to spend this offseason. Fungible. Just like last year when we wrote the club was looking to spend about $15. They went over that.

The argument here, to me at least, is disagreements over the Bengals methodology. That is fair.

Should they cut guys like Hall, Peko and Maualuga, Jones, etc. and incur dead money? All reasonable questions to ask and be mad about. They will argue that if they don't some players see the life of the deal, they won't be able to get them agree to them in the first place (thus creating more cap issues with having to pay out more up front).

They do not use roll over money for current-year free agents. Never have. Should they? It could be argued they should. That's their view point.

Should they roll the dice on injuries and shallow out the injury protection pool? Maybe. It could be argued they should. Again, they choose to go that route.

As for the draft pool...total estimate. It's not determined until AFTER the draft. Any projection you see is based off the club standing pat and keeping all 11 picks. The pool changes with trades, etc.

It's not worth latching on to the Brown and Bell decisions in Pittsburgh, in my opinion. They've been cutting and restructuring guys for years in order to do this. They've generally had a cap mess. If the Bengals had those guys, I believe they would pay them. People get mad at M. Jones and maybe Zeitler leaving, but know who hasn't gotten away after their first deals? Geno Atkins. A.J. Green. Andy Dalton. An in-his-prime Whitworth. They've made sure to get those guys done, at near top of positional market value.

That's where "sign your own" comes into play. They can't keep everyone. No one does. It's easy to list who went away. But honestly, the rollover two years ago was entirely used on A.J. Green. Would you have preferred him hitting the UFA market? Marvin Jones received the same total dollars and years Detroit offered him. He chose to leave. Not much the club can do there. They made a decision on an aging Nelson. Objectively, I make the same call and it was the right one. Same with Sanu. Last year they used the roll over on Bernard, Hewitt and Williams. Now, if you want to argue that they should have planned for Jones' potential departure in the 2015 draft, that's valid and right.

[Luvnit2]

(02-28-2017, 10:43 PM)jowczarski Wrote: A lot to unpack here.

The Pistons, who did the quick math down to about $28 is on the right path. Add likely RFA tender T.J. Johnson ($1.9M), the practice squad ($1.3M) and the widely recognized injury protection pool (roughly $5M) you're looking in the area of about $16-20 the club is looking to spend this offseason. Fungible. Just like last year when we wrote the club was looking to spend about $15. They went over that.

The argument here, to me at least, is disagreements over the Bengals methodology. That is fair.

Should they cut guys like Hall, Peko and Maualuga, Jones, etc. and incur dead money? All reasonable questions to ask and be mad about. They will argue that if they don't some players see the life of the deal, they won't be able to get them agree to them in the first place (thus creating more cap issues with having to pay out more up front).

They do not use roll over money for current-year free agents. Never have. Should they? It could be argued they should. That's their view point.

Should they roll the dice on injuries and shallow out the injury protection pool? Maybe. It could be argued they should. Again, they choose to go that route.

As for the draft pool...total estimate. It's not determined until AFTER the draft. Any projection you see is based off the club standing pat and keeping all 11 picks. The pool changes with trades, etc.

It's not worth latching on to the Brown and Bell decisions in Pittsburgh, in my opinion. They've been cutting and restructuring guys for years in order to do this. They've generally had a cap mess. If the Bengals had those guys, I believe they would pay them. People get mad at M. Jones and maybe Zeitler leaving, but know who hasn't gotten away after their first deals? Geno Atkins. A.J. Green. Andy Dalton. An in-his-prime Whitworth. They've made sure to get those guys done, at near top of positional market value.

That's where "sign your own" comes into play. They can't keep everyone. No one does. It's easy to list who went away. But honestly, the rollover two years ago was entirely used on A.J. Green. Would you have preferred him hitting the UFA market? Marvin Jones received the same total dollars and years Detroit offered him. He chose to leave. Not much the club can do there. They made a decision on an aging Nelson. Objectively, I make the same call and it was the right one. Same with Sanu. Last year they used the roll over on Bernard, Hewitt and Williams. Now, if you want to argue that they should have planned for Jones' potential departure in the 2015 draft, that's valid and right.

Thanks for great points. I think the frustrating part for us is we understand the Bengals use a long term strategy, but they never deviate at any point for any reason. It could be argued once every 5 or 10 years to go sign that top player available in free agency or even a couple of mid range guys to get the team over the hump. look at past winners and you see the Pats, Ravens, Seahawks and others have not stayed 100% to one strategy, but in fact apply different shorter term tactics to win now.

Simply, the Brown family seems to exercise no flexibility in spite of not one playoff win since 1990 and zero Super Bowl wins in almost 50 years. I defend them but I too would like to see us have a win now mentality, we don't as if our owner's goal is to be competitive year after year versus a Bob Kraft goal of winning it all each year.

[Housh]

(02-28-2017, 09:54 PM)fredtoast Wrote: So let me get this straight.  

You don't agree with the way the bengals are trying to win.  Since you know eactly hwo to win in the NFL and it is impossible for you to ever be wrong the only possible way anyone can disagree with you is if they do not want to win.

Wow, you have a pretty high opinion of yourself, don't you.

BTW since it is impossible for you to be wrong about your theory on how to win in the NFL why aren't you making millions of dollars running an NFL team?

By this logic isn't your opinion totally worthless as well?

#StayConsistentFred

[JumboTron]

(02-28-2017, 10:43 PM)jowczarski Wrote: A lot to unpack here.

The Pistons, who did the quick math down to about $28 is on the right path. Add likely RFA tender T.J. Johnson ($1.9M), the practice squad ($1.3M) and the widely recognized injury protection pool (roughly $5M) you're looking in the area of about $16-20 the club is looking to spend this offseason. Fungible. Just like last year when we wrote the club was looking to spend about $15. They went over that.

The argument here, to me at least, is disagreements over the Bengals methodology. That is fair.

Should they cut guys like Hall, Peko and Maualuga, Jones, etc. and incur dead money? All reasonable questions to ask and be mad about. They will argue that if they don't some players see the life of the deal, they won't be able to get them agree to them in the first place (thus creating more cap issues with having to pay out more up front).

They do not use roll over money for current-year free agents. Never have. Should they? It could be argued they should. That's their view point.

Should they roll the dice on injuries and shallow out the injury protection pool? Maybe. It could be argued they should. Again, they choose to go that route.

As for the draft pool...total estimate. It's not determined until AFTER the draft. Any projection you see is based off the club standing pat and keeping all 11 picks. The pool changes with trades, etc.

It's not worth latching on to the Brown and Bell decisions in Pittsburgh, in my opinion. They've been cutting and restructuring guys for years in order to do this. They've generally had a cap mess. If the Bengals had those guys, I believe they would pay them. People get mad at M. Jones and maybe Zeitler leaving, but know who hasn't gotten away after their first deals? Geno Atkins. A.J. Green. Andy Dalton. An in-his-prime Whitworth. They've made sure to get those guys done, at near top of positional market value.

That's where "sign your own" comes into play. They can't keep everyone. No one does. It's easy to list who went away. But honestly, the rollover two years ago was entirely used on A.J. Green. Would you have preferred him hitting the UFA market? Marvin Jones received the same total dollars and years Detroit offered him. He chose to leave. Not much the club can do there. They made a decision on an aging Nelson. Objectively, I make the same call and it was the right one. Same with Sanu. Last year they used the roll over on Bernard, Hewitt and Williams. Now, if you want to argue that they should have planned for Jones' potential departure in the 2015 draft, that's valid and right.

Nailed it.

I'm the furthest thing from a Brown apologist but the Bengals, for the most part, have done what they had to do when they had to do it in terms of locking down key guys.  I am of the belief that off-season roster management is one of this organization's greatest strengths.  Has that resulted in wins when it mattered most?  Nope, but that lays squarely on the shoulders of the coaching staff.  The powers that be in the department of talent retention and acquisition over the last six years have done their jobs.

[BengalChris]

(02-28-2017, 01:02 PM)Au165 Wrote: Look at their cap breakdowns and show me where they "Lied" and didn't spend the money. Calling people dumb is funny because the math would say those that believe them are in fact correct, and those who don't are ignorant to the actual cap. The roll over is used, now how they use it is up in the air, but the roll over is used as the NFLPA numbers show.

According to Spotrac
In 2016 the team had 5,108,306 cap space left at the end of the year and it looks like they've carried over 6,578,866 to 2017. Not sure how they can carry over more than they had left, this also occurred in 2013 and 2012.
In 2015 the team had 8,216,924 left and carried over 7,587,902 to 2016.
In 2014 the team had 10,021,378 left and carried over 8,697,310 to 2015.
In 2013 the team had 7,964,686 left and carried over 8,663,480 to 2014.
In 2012 the team had 5,029,418 left and carried over 8,579,575 to 2013.
In 2011 the team had 26,496,471 left and there was none recorded carry over to 2012. Unspent cap money that isn't rolled over is kept by the team, that is to say its owner, which is to say Mikey Brown.

In 2011 they simply just didn't rollover the money. $26M unused, never-will-be-used salary cap space. Since then it's almost as if they just keep rolling about the same amount one year into the next, so I don't see that they are using it.

I'm sure the Bengals use more cap space than a number of other teams, but we never see them cut under-performers to make cap room for more proven players either.


EDIT:
Places the team could add some cap space.
Adam Pacman Jones counts 7,666,666 against the cap in 2017 and has a dead cap amount of 1,333,334 if he's cut.

Ray Maualuga counts 3,668,750 against the cap has no dead cap amount.

That's 9M+ in cap space right there just waiting to be grabbed by more talented and, in Adam Jones' case, more worthy players.

[jowczarski]

@BengalChris - That line about carrying over no money from 2011 to '12 didn't make sense to me because it was the first year of the new CBA that allowed for that. John Clayton wrote in '12 that the Bengals carried over $15M from 2011 to 2012.
http://www.espn.com/nfl/story/_/id/7570116/nfl-plenty-cap-room-improve
Spotrac and Over The Cap are great resources but always remember they are incomplete, pull their information from other people/sites that report figures, and in some ways include educated guesses. For instance, those sites didn't know McCarron was actually a restricted free agent in 2018.

Edit: As for the argument about moving on from older players, that is a fair one. They try to choose to honor a contract to the end and get something out of those players rather than incur those costs + cost of a new player. Worth questioning that methodology in some instances.

[Sled21]

Unless I'm wrong, did the Steelers not use the franchise tag on Bell for this year? When his new contract hits, they will be paying Pig Ben, Brown and Bell around 35% of cap money, which is getting into dangerous territory. They are going to have to let other key players go. Just like Detroit when Megatron, Suh and Stafford got to something like 37% of the money between 3 players, the team suffered. Same with Flacco in Baltimore. It will be interesting to see who gets released in Shitsburgh when Bell gets his new deal. 

[*Wyche'sWarrior*]

(02-28-2017, 11:06 PM)Luvnit2 Wrote: Thanks for great points. I think the frustrating part for us is we understand the Bengals use a long term strategy, but they never deviate at any point for any reason. It could be argued once every 5 or 10 years to go sign that top player available in free agency or even a couple of mid range guys to get the team over the hump. look at past winners and you see the Pats, Ravens, Seahawks and others have not stayed 100% to one strategy, but in fact apply different shorter term tactics to win now.

Simply, the Brown family seems to exercise no flexibility in spite of not one playoff win since 1990 and zero Super Bowl wins in almost 50 years. I defend them but I too would like to see us have a win now mentality, we don't as if our owner's goal is to be competitive year after year versus a Bob Kraft goal of winning it all each year.

Exactly Luvnit.....it seems stubbornness and ego get in the way of adapting and adjusting on the fly.  It starts at the top and trickles down to the coaching staff.  It's complete lunacy.

[*Wyche'sWarrior*]

(02-28-2017, 11:52 PM)JumboTron Wrote: Nailed it.

I'm the furthest thing from a Brown apologist but the Bengals, for the most part, have done what they had to do when they had to do it in terms of locking down key guys.  I am of the belief that off-season roster management is one of this organization's greatest strengths.  Has that resulted in wins when it mattered most?  Nope, but that lays squarely on the shoulders of the coaching staff.  The powers that be in the department of talent retention and acquisition over the last six years have done their jobs.

That's a fair assessment, but on the flip......they haven't done their job by retaining this shit show of a coaching staff.

[THE PISTONS]

(02-28-2017, 11:52 PM)JumboTron Wrote: Nailed it.

I'm the furthest thing from a Brown apologist but the Bengals, for the most part, have done what they had to do when they had to do it in terms of locking down key guys.  I am of the belief that off-season roster management is one of this organization's greatest strengths.  Has that resulted in wins when it mattered most?  Nope, but that lays squarely on the shoulders of the coaching staff.  The powers that be in the department of talent retention and acquisition over the last six years have done their jobs.

For the most part I agree...but want to extend this thought.

The 5 years we made the playoffs in a row were our peak years. Teams typically don't have a run like that.

Some of those years we rolled over a lot of cap space. One has to wonder, if maybe signing a veteran LB like Darryl Smith who could cover a TE when we sorely needed that or a Center who would have been an upgrade as opposed to starting a 4th Round pick would have yielded a playoff win.

The Bengals don't start 1st Round picks in Year 1 and drafted a Center in the 4th Round in Bodine and handed him the starting spot with little competition. What if they brought in a free agent?

Then, the coaching staff comparisons that have been brought up are valid...although Gruden and Zimmer were pretty Top notch assistants. People bash Marvin for play calls...but the coordinators are the ones making the plays.

[samhain]

(03-01-2017, 01:12 AM)jowczarski Wrote: @BengalChris - That line about carrying over no money from 2011 to '12 didn't make sense to me because it was the first year of the new CBA that allowed for that. John Clayton wrote in '12 that the Bengals carried over $15M from 2011 to 2012.
http://www.espn.com/nfl/story/_/id/7570116/nfl-plenty-cap-room-improve
Spotrac and Over The Cap are great resources but always remember they are incomplete, pull their information from other people/sites that report figures, and in some ways include educated guesses. For instance, those sites didn't know McCarron was actually a restricted free agent in 2018.

Edit: As for the argument about moving on from older players, that is a fair one. They try to choose to honor a contract to the end and get something out of those players rather than incur those costs + cost of a new player. Worth questioning that methodology in some instances.

It's not even all about older players at this point with the Jones scenario.  Unlike some here, I think there's no doubt that Adam has a place on this team if he stays out of trouble this offseason.  He may have experienced a slight decline in play, but he's still pretty good.  

Unfortunately, we know he did not stay out of trouble.  He embarrassed himself and the city.  I won't say he embarrassed the Browns or the organization, because I don't believe they feel that particular emotion like normal human beings.   

Now we have Adam, making a lot of money just begging to be released and a good starting corner in Dre due for a payday.  what is so hard about this for them to figure out?  Cut a habitual criminal who likely won't be available to you for a chunk of the season to pay a much younger, capable player that will.  Totally insane not to do this IMO.

[THE PISTONS]

(03-01-2017, 09:59 AM)Sled21 Wrote: Unless I'm wrong, did the Steelers not use the franchise tag on Bell for this year? When his new contract hits, they will be paying Pig Ben, Brown and Bell around 35% of cap money, which is getting into dangerous territory. They are going to have to let other key players go. Just like Detroit when Megatron, Suh and Stafford got to something like 37% of the money between 3 players, the team suffered. Same with Flacco in Baltimore. It will be interesting to see who gets released in Shitsburgh when Bell gets his new deal. 

People have been saying this about the Steelers for years...and it never seems to affect their play on the field.

They've won atleast 10 games since 2001...11 times. They've won under 8 games...exactly 1 time.

Over that span, we've won atleast 10 games 6 times. We've won under 8 games...7 times.

Yeah we have a clean cap and they push the boundaries...but really which team is paying the piper for it?

[Sled21]

(03-01-2017, 12:12 PM)THE PISTONS Wrote: People have been saying this about the Steelers for years...and it never seems to affect their play on the field.

They've won atleast 10 games since 2001...11 times. They've won under 8 games...exactly 1 time.

Over that span, we've won atleast 10 games 6 times. We've won under 8 games...7 times.

Yeah we have a clean cap and they push the boundaries...but really which team is paying the piper for it?

Well the numbers are the numbers, and when they pay Bell that big contract he is going to command, they will have to make it work and cut some people. I didn't say they won't make it work, I said it will be interesting to watch....