The Cleveland Browns are one of the few teams to avoid any real complications from the lowered NFL salary cap in 2021. It seems GM Andrew Berry and the Browns won’t have to worry as much about the cap in 2022, either.
The NFL and NFLPA have agreed to bump the 2022 salary cap to $208.2 million, which represents the highest season-to-season increase in league history. In 2020 the cap is just $182.5 million, down from over $198 million in 2019. The loss of ticketing and revenues due to the COVID-19 pandemic cause the precipitous drop.
Berry and the Browns still have over $20 million in cap space available for 2021, the fourth-most in the league. But that ranking drops to 25th for 2022, and the Browns have several key players — Baker Mayfield, Nick Chubb, Denzel Ward — who will be looking for big contract extensions.
The record-setting bump of over $25 million added to the 2022 cap for all teams gives the Browns a lot more room to operate. Cleveland can also rollover any of the excess cap figure it holds in 2021 to create even more space.