The Indianapolis Colts converted a portion of quarterback Matt Ryan’s salary into a signing bonus on Thursday, which created $6 million in salary-cap space, per Field Yates of ESPN.
A move like this was to be expected after the Colts sent a third-round pick to the Falcons in exchange for Ryan and the remainder of his two-year contract.
Ryan was set to make just over $24.7 million in 2022, and the Colts converted $12 million of it into a signing bonus. Since that prorates over the next two seasons against the cap, the Colts save $6 million for this offseason.
The Colts have converted $12M of new QB Matt Ryan’s 2022 compensation into a signing bonus, creating $6M in cap space, per source.
Ryan’s cap number drops to $18,705,882 for this year, while Indy has even more cap space to make other maneuvers this offseason.
— Field Yates (@FieldYates) March 24, 2022
While this lowers the cap hit for Ryan down to $18.7 million for the 2022 season, that extra $6 million that gets tacked on in 2023 raises his cap hit for that season to $35.2 million, according to Over The Cap.
That could explain why they didn’t convert the entire $17 million of his base salary, which would have helped this offseason but created an even larger cap hit in 2023.
With this new restructure, the Colts now have roughly $21 million in salary-cap space, which is the eighth-most in the NFL.
The Colts could still restructure a few other contracts if they really wanted to but the expectation is likely that they will make subtle moves in free agency leading up to the draft.
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