Report: Lions, Carlton Davis agree to contract adjustment

Report: Lions, Carlton Davis agree to contract adjustment that frees up more cap room

One of the biggest moves from the Detroit Lions this offseason has been trading for former Buccaneers cornerback Carlton Davis. The Lions dealt a third-round pick in 2024 for Davis and two sixth-round picks.

Now that move has a corollary offshoot. Per Jason from Over The Cap, the Lions have agreed to restructure Davis’ three-year, $44.5 million contract he signed with Tampa Bay prior to the 2022 season.

It appears the Lions converted some of his 2024 salary into a bonus, as well as adding on void years to further spread out the impact on the salary cap. The restructuring does not extend Davis’ tenure in Detroit beyond 2024.

The restructured deal parameters, as broken down by Over The Cap,

The Lions traded for Davis in 2024. Following the trade they restructured his contract, converting $6 million in salary to a bonus. The move reduced his 2024 cap number by $4.5 million.

The contract restructuring has not yet been officially recognized on the NFL’s transaction wire or by the Lions, so don’t go spending that extra cap room in 2024 just yet…

Breaking down Amik Robertson’s free agent deal with the Lions

Breaking down CB Amik Robertson’s free agent deal with the Detroit Lions

The Detroit Lions added former Raiders cornerback Amik Robertson as one of the team’s top free agent additions in 2024. The contract details are now available for Robertson, who will be in the mix at outside cornerback for the new-look Lions secondary.

Robertson’s deal is a modest one. Per Over the Cap, the fifth-year cornerback signed for two years and $9.25 million. It comes with a $3.3 million signing bonus and $4.5 million guaranteed, which includes the full signing bonus and $1.2 million in salary in 2024. He will count $2.85 million in cap room in 2024.

That $1.2 million figure is Robertson’s full salary in 2024. Other than the $1.65 million amortization of the signing bonus, nothing else is guaranteed for the second year of the contract.

There is a $500,000 roster bonus for Robertson in 2025 payable on the fifth day of the league year, as well as a $50,000 workout bonus for next season. His $4.2 million base salary in 2025 features no guarantees, which means the Lions can cut bait without creating much dead money if Robertson doesn’t work out for the team.

Cap ramifications as Cowboys release Michael Gallup, Leighton Vander Esch

The Dallas Cowboys have had the ability to create a ton of cap space whenever they felt like it this offseason. Anyone believing the lack of acquisitions in free agency has been related to them being up against the cap ceiling without making moves …

The Dallas Cowboys have had the ability to create a ton of cap space whenever they felt like it this offseason. Anyone believing the lack of acquisitions in free agency has been related to them being up against the cap ceiling without making moves on Dak Prescott or CeeDee Lamb have been mistaken. The team has made smaller moves, bringing in Eric Kendricks to help at linebacker and bringing back Jourdan Lewis and C.J. Goodwin to help the defense and special teams, respectively.

Starting the offseason with just under $2 million of space isn’t enough to make all three of those moves official. On Friday, the club announced two of the least surprising decisions, releasing the last two members of their 2018 draft class, linebacker Leighton Vander Esch and wide receiver Michael Gallup. Both players have storied injury history that prevented them from accomplishing the heights they teased throughout their early careers.

Vander Esch was the team’s first-round pick in 2018, hailing from Boise State. A familiar pipeline for the Cowboys, they’ve had many Broncos in their fold, but Vander Esch had the highest draft pedigree among them. His career started out well, earning a Pro Bowl nod and being named second-team All-Pro as a rookie while playing a full 16 games. He made 140 tackles that year with two interceptions.

However a series of neck injuries since a pinched nerve suffered in 2016 limited him to just one more full season over the next five campaigns.

Vander Esch played in just 19 games over the 2019 and 2020 seasons, and after a full slate in 2021, played in just 19 games over the last two seasons. During a Week 5 loss to San Francisco, 49ers OT Trent Williams blocked Vander Esch into Micah Parsons, causing a significant injury where his career was put in jeopardy.

There have been many concerned since last year that Vander Esch would not be able to return to football, and though Friday’s announcement didnt’ say he was retiring, he will not be with the Dallas Cowboys moving forward.

Gallup was a third-round pick out of Colorado State when the Cowboys plucked him in 2018. He would then be paired with Amari Cooper after a midseason trade and had a tremendous sophomore campaign in 2019, hauling in 66 receptions for 1,106 yards and six touchdowns. The following year, CeeDee Lamb fell to the Cowboys in the draft and visions of a three-headed monster at wideout were had by all.

Only it never really came to fruition.

In 2021, Gallup tore his ACL and while he was known as one of the best contested ball catchers in the league, he was never a huge separator. The knee injury exacerbated that shortcoming and his 2022 campaign was lackluster. In 14 games he caught just 39 passes and didn’t surpass 500 receiving yards. The thought process was that a full year removed from the injury would see him bounce back, but despite quarterback Dak Prescott turning in a performance worthy of MVP votes, Gallup’s numbers didn’t escalate.

Vander Esch’s release means the Cowboys save at least $2.15 million against the 2024 cap and that money is available immediately.He was set to make $3 million in base salary and another $147k in roster bonuses. $1 million of his base salary was guaranteed, meaning a release or retirement puts just over $2 million back into Dallas’ cap space. With the team releasing him with an injury designation, perhaps there was an agreement to lessen the $1 million they will need to pay him.

Meanwhile the savings from Gallup’s release will be much greater, they just won’t be immediate.

Gallup was released with a June 1 designation. That allows the team to avoid accelerating the bonus-money allocation that remains from 2025 and beyond onto this season’s cap. Any player released after June 1 impacts the cap in this way and each NFL team is allowed to designate two players such as this in advance of that date.

It allows the player to enter free agency when the other 31 teams have not spent all of their cap space, increasing the odds that player can be signed elsewhere. For the team though, the cap savings do not occur until June 2.

That means the money saved from releasing Gallup, his base salary of $8.5 million plus another $1 million in game-day bonuses, will not hit the cap until later in the offseason. It will be used for signing the draft class and carrying cap space into the season for IR replacement signings and end-of-year incentives.

Browns restructure yet another contract, clear $10 million in cap space

That’s another $10 million in cap space.

The Cleveland Browns have done it again, clearing an additional $10 million in cap space by restructuring the contract of new wide receiver Jerry Jeudy.

This was alluded to early this week by Browns Wire after the trade was made as all of Jeudy’s 2024 cap hit was base salary. This gave the Browns the giant opportunity to take $10 million of that cap hit and convert it to a bonus to pay to Jeudy upfront. His cap hit now drops to just $2.987 million on the season.

This comes after the first wave of free agency where the Browns traded for Jeudy, retained Za’Darius Smith, Maurice Hurst, Shelby Harris, and more, and even added a few players like linebackers Jordan Hicks and Devin Bush.

As free agency continues, this gives general manager Andrew Berry quite a bit of wiggle room to play around with as the offseason is still young. It also gives Berry the breathing room to cover some of the deals he has already agreed to as well.

Vikings clear salary cap space, release Dean Lowry and William Kwenkeu

The Minnesota Vikings have released DE Dean Lowry and ILB William Kwenkeu to save salary cap space.

The Minnesota Vikings continue to make things happen in free agency. After agreeing to terms with six players and re-signing two of their own, the Vikings announced they have released defensive end Dean Lowry and linebacker William Kwenkeu.

The move is projected to save about $3 million on the salary cap with Kwenkeu having a non-guaranteed salary of $915,000 and $2,082,353 with the Lowry release. He does incur $2,400,000 in dead cap from his signing last year.

During his time playing with the Vikings, Lowry only ended up playing in nine games before tearing his pectoral muscle. Those eight games weren’t great either, having a grade of 47.4 overall.

Kwenkeu was waived during training camp last year with an injury designation and he reverted back to injured reserve. He was initially signed as an undrafted free agent in 2022.

More moves are likely coming, especially with safety Harrison Smith having a cap hit of over $19 million for the 2024 season.

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Looking at Jerry Jeudy’s contract and the likelihood of a Browns restructure

The Browns have acquired Jerry Jeudy. Now what?

The Cleveland Browns have added wide receiver Jerry Jeudy in a trade with the Denver Broncos. And in doing so, have taken on a $12.9 million cap hit in the form of the former first rounder’s fifth-year option, which Denver picked up a year ago.

Look for the Browns to restructure that deal so a large chunk of that almost $13 million will not count against the salary cap.

After all, the Browns just did this with the fifth-year option of their own in Jedrick Wills. Fifth-year options are all base salary and very minimal bonuses. In Jeudy’s case, there are no bonuses to it.

This makes the contract extremely easy to restructure. The Browns could easily restructure the deal of Jeudy, pay out his base up front as a bonus out of the pocket of the owner, and then save that money off the cap on the back end.

What this means is the Browns will also likely add a void year or two to the back of Jeudy’s contract, where he will have a dead money hit even after he is not on the team. However, as the salary cap continues to rise, one dollar in 2024 will cost only a fraction of that in future years.

And that will likely happen at some point.

Updated Saints salary cap space after extending Tyrann Mathieu

How did extending Tyrann Mathieu and tendering Rashid Shaheed impact the Saints’ salary cap? Here’s an update on how much more space New Orleans must clear:

It isn’t really accurate to say we’re updating the New Orleans Saints’ salary cap space situation — the team doesn’t have any space under the cap right now because they’re still over the cap by about $10.7 million. But a couple of recent moves have changed the situation, so let’s take stock of where things currently stand.

Per Over The Cap’s experts, the Saints are currently in the red by an estimated $10,602,3364. Now that only reflects the information and roster moves which have been made publicly available. It’s very possible that the Saints have already checked all their boxes and reached cap compliance without leaking anything to the media. It’s not like they’re frantically working to beat the deadline (next Wednesday at 3 p.m. CT).

And two recent moves changed that projection. The Saints signed starting safety Tyrann Mathieu to a new two-year contract valued at $13.5 million, with a salary cap hit of just $5,567,000 for 2024. That pushed them down to a nearly-level $10.5 million level over the spending limit.

But another shoe dropped when the Saints tendered Pro Bowl returns specialist Rashid Shaheed, an exclusive rights free agent. That costs $985,000 against the cap. Because only the top 51 cap hits count on the books at this time of the year, Shaheed pushed a lesser-valued contract of $795,000 (there’s six different players all carrying that number) beneath the threshold. So the true cost to the cap was only $190,000, meaning the Saints are in the red by $10,792,634.

At least at the time of writing. More moves are on the way. Obvious dominoes yet to fall include cap hits for right tackle Ryan Ramczyk ($27 million), running back Alvin Kamara ($18.7 million), linebacker Demario Davis ($18.1 million) and do-it-all weapon Taysom Hill ($15.7 million). There are other levers the Saints can pull if they really want to max out their cap resources, but those are the big ones to watch.

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Cowboys convert Zack Martin’s final contract year to get under salary cap

A look at how Dallas converted Zack Martin’s salary into more cap space while paying him the same amount. The Cowboys are now cap compliant for 2024. | From @KDDrummondNFL

The Dallas Cowboys have pulled their first trigger of the 2024 league year. On Friday, just 72 hours before the legal tampering window opens for free agency, the team made one of the moves that will allow them to start shopping. Whether that be at Saks Fifth Avenue or Walmart remains to be seen, but teams must at a minimum be under the $255.4 million salary cap by Wednesday, 4pm eastern time.

Dallas was approximately $11 million over the cap, but on Friday restructured the final year of Zack Martin’s contract, pushing cap hit into the future, to get themselves under the threshold.

Martin, scheduled to make $18 million in base salary this season, all guaranteed after a holdout last training camp, was set to cost Dallas $28.5 million against the cap.

A player’s cap hit is a combination of current year base salary and incentives, plus any amortized bonus money from previous seasons that had been spread out over the length of the contract.

Martin had $10.5 million of bonus hits for 2024 in addition to the base salary.

In restructuring the deal, Dallas still gives Martin his entire $18 million of salary, but they converted $16.25 million of that into a bonus while adding a third void year to his deal.

Void years are accounting tools NFL teams have that allow them to push cap allocations beyond the actual length of the deal. Martin now has four void years, from 2025 to 2028, on his deal totaling just under $23 million.

If no extension is worked out before next season, then all of the void year cap hits will be on the Cowboys’ 2025 cap as dead money.

For now, that $16.25 million restructure bonus, which will still be paid to Martin this season, is allocated evenly between the 2024, 2025, 2026, 2027 and 2028 cap amounts, at $3.25 million per year.

So Martin’s 2024 cap hit is now his new base salary, $1.75 million, his previous bonus allocation, $10.5 million, and the new restructure allocation of $3.25 million.

Now Martin’s 2024 cap hit is $15.5 million, saving the team $13 million in cap space while still paying Martin the exact same amount. With NFL salary caps going up every year, that $13 million takes up a lower percentage of future year’s caps, essentially giving the team greater spending power.

According to Over the Cap, Dallas is now $1.8 million under the cap.

 

New Orleans Saints to release starting safety Marcus Maye

The New Orleans Saints intend to release starting safety Marcus Maye at the start of the league year, per Bleacher Report’s Jordan Schultz:

The New Orleans Saints plan to release starting safety Marcus Maye when the new league year kicks off on March 13, per Bleacher Report’s Jordan Schultz. Maye had missed as many games (17) as he played for New Orleans (17) due to several injuries and a suspension over his two years with the team.

So it’s not too surprising that he’s being let go. Maye was due to count $9.6 million against the salary cap in 2024, the last year of his contract, and the Saints decided it’s worth more to replace him than keep it going. What’s curious is how they’re doing it.

If the Saints are simply cutting Maye loose they’ll have to pay more than $8.4 million against the cap in dead money, meaning they’re saving just $1.1 million by parting ways. But if they’re using one of their two post-June 1 cut designations on Maye, it means they’ll save the $1.1 million now and get another $6 million in savings over the summer to use to sign their rookie draft class and maybe some free agents for training camp. They’ll spread out the dead money with cap hits of $2.4 million in 2024 and $6 million in 2025, but again, the big savings won’t hit until June 2.

Which complicates things. Remember, teams are only allowed to use two of these designations. If the Saints are burning one of them on Maye then it means they can’t use it on one of the other two players who are seen as candidates for the post-June 1 release: Jameis Winston and Michael Thomas. Both players have firm deadlines to be released or extended so this isn’t a move the Saints are taking lightly. It means they’ve already decided which of them will be staying and who will be going.

Winston currently has a salary cap hit of $4.5 million but it’ll grow by about $100 million if he’s still on the roster by March 16, which means the Saints must tear up his contract and sign a new one or let him leave in free agency. Thomas is in a similar position with a $12.4 million cap hit. Releasing either of them with the post-June 1 designation would only save about $1.2 million, so this is all more procedural than actually helpful for the salary cap.

So stay tuned for clarity on Maye’s release and its impact on the Saints’ cap situation. What’s certain is that they must make their outgoing free agents at safety (guys like Johnathan Abram, Lonnie Johnson, and Ugo Amadi) priorities to re-sign. They should also consider additions in the draft or free agency to compete with Jordan Howden for the starting job next to Tyrann Mathieu — who, it should be noted, has played well in New Orleans and could sign an extension to finish his career in his hometown.

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Vikings to save $3.35 million with release of Alexander Mattison

The Minnesota Vikings are set to save $3.35 million in salary cap space with the release of running back Alexander Matison.

The Minnesota Vikings informed running back Alexander Mattison of his release on Thursday. The initial numbers showed that he would cost $4 million in dead money on the salary cap.

According to multiple sources including Over The Cap’s Jason Fitzgerald, Mattison’s $2.75 million in guaranteed salary for 2024 wasn’t fully guaranteed like initially thought. That money was set to fully guarantee on March 15th, the third day of the league year.

This sets the Vikings up in a better spot than initially thought. They will sit about $39 million under the salary cap before they choose to make any other moves to create salary cap space.

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