Tag: cap hits

Saints rank top-10 in salary cap space after free agency spending spree

Updating the New Orleans Saints salary cap outlook after their free agency spending spree; Saints have 6th-most spending room ahead of 2023 NFL draft

It’s been a busy week for the New Orleans Saints, and they’re positioned well to clean up during the next wave of free agency. The Saints signed veteran free agents like defensive tackles Nathan Shepherd and Khalen Saunders as well as running back Jamaal Williams, who account for a combined $5.74 million against the 2023 salary cap (roughly 2.5% of the team’s spending limit). New Orleans also brought back special teams linebacker Ty Summers and signed backup right tackle Storm Norton, likely both on veteran’s minimum contracts that will have minimal salary cap impact.

That leaves the team with approximately $17.3 million to spend ahead of the 2023 NFL draft. Take out the $3.2 million budgeted for their rookie draft class and New Orleans is left with more than $14.2 million in cap space, which ranks sixth-best around the league. They’ll be able to make competitive offers for free agents like tight end Foster Moreau, who visited the team on Saturday after meeting with the Cincinnati Bengals (who have $16.4 million in effective cap space, accounting for their draft class). Let’s see what general manager Mickey Loomis and his front office personnel do with these resources.

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Derek Carr contract details: QB gets no-trade clause, Saints get exit ramp in 2025

Derek Carr contract details: QB gets no-trade clause, Saints get exit ramp after just two years into new deal

Both sides have to feel happy about this one. We’ve got the details on Derek Carr’s contract with the New Orleans Saints thanks to Pro Football Talk’s Mike Florio, and it’s enlightening. While the new deal is being advertised as a four-year, $150 million commitment (and it does max out at those values), in reality Carr’s per-year earnings will fall to about half of that. Thanks to some creative accounting, the Saints structured this so that Carr’s 2023 salary cap hit is only about $7.2 million, taking up roughly 3.2% of the league spending limit. Carr got a no-trade clause out of the arrangement, which gives him some control in the second half of his career.

Florio reports that Carr received a $28.5 million signing bonus from New Orleans, which will toll over the course of five years (with a void year likely written into 2027 for accounting purposes). Most interesting is the non-guaranteed $50 million base salary written in for 2026. That raises the overall average per-year income from $33.3 million to $37.5 million per year, boosting Carr from ranking 12th among quarterbacks to 9th. That $50 million is funny money, though, and it’ll either be wiped out in an eventual release or else be restructured into a signing bonus on a new deal.

Here’s what you need to know about Carr’s new contract with the Saints, based off Florio’s reporting:

  • 2023: $7,200,000 salary cap hit ($1,500,000 base salary, $5,700,000 signing bonus proration)
  • 2024: $35,700,000 salary cap hit ($30,000,000 base salary, $5,700,000 signing bonus proration)
  • 2025: $45,700,000 salary cap hit ($30,000,000 base salary, $5,700,000 signing bonus proration, $10,000,000 roster bonus)
  • 2026: $55,700,000 salary cap hit ($50,000,000 base salary, $5,700,000 signing bonus proration)
  • 2027: $5,700,000 salary cap hit (Contract voids, leaving $5,700,000 behind in dead money from signing bonus proration)

The Saints can kick the can down the road in each of those future years with more restructures, converting base salary and roster bonuses into new signing bonuses, but that won’t happen if Carr hasn’t earned it. Only his base salaries in 2023 and 2024 are guaranteed at signing, and his 2025 base salary is only guaranteed for injury. A $10 million portion of his 2025 base salary will become guaranteed if he’s still on the roster in 2024 (that’s the roster bonus mentioned earlier).

So the Saints gave themselves an exit ramp here in 2025. If Carr declines and doesn’t perform as hoped, they can release him after two years and be left a dead money salary cap charge of about $27,100,000 between the guaranteed roster bonus and leftover signing bonus prorations (which accelerate to the year he’s released). There are more factors we don’t know about yet, and they could spread out those dead money costs by designating him a post-June 1 cut, but that’s the gist of it. Hopefully Carr continues to play at a Pro Bowl level so he can get this team where they want to go.

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Saints salary cap space update after restructuring Demario Davis and Taysom Hill

We’re almost to the finish line. Updating the New Orleans Saints salary cap situation after restructuring Demario Davis and Taysom Hill:

So how much salary cap space do the New Orleans Saints have at their disposal after restructuring their contracts with linebacker Demario Davis and utility player Taysom Hill? Converting salaries to signing bonuses with each of them saved the Saints about $12.7 million, but they were over the cap by a substantial margin before knocking those items off their offseason checklist.

Well, they don’t have any spending room yet. The Saints are still over the 2023 salary cap by as much as $18.1 million, per Over The Cap (a more conservative estimate from Spotrac has New Orleans in the red by $17.2 million). But the finish line is within sight.

There are five players left with salary cap hits valued at more than $15 million, and the Saints will need to make a decision with each of them: restructure, extend, or release. Here’s the list:

  • DE Cameron Jordan: $25.7 million
  • CB Marshon Lattimore: $22.4 million
  • LG Andrus Peat: $18.3 million
  • RB Alvin Kamara: $16 million
  • QB Jameis Winston: $15.6 million

Wide receiver Michael Thomas also has a cap number of $13.3 million after previously redoing his deal, and the expectation is that he’s going to be released at the start of the new league year with a post-June 1 designation. He could return on a new deal at a significantly lower salary, but but that’s too far ahead to guess at. Teams may use that designation twice in advance of the June 1 deadline, and it’s an option for either Peat or Winston depending on how things shake.

Lattimore and Kamara should be easy calls to restructure given their age and productivity (and in Kamara’s case, it would prevent him from losing much money to a possible NFL suspension stemming from his Las Vegas battery case; weekly salaries are forfeited, but signing bonuses are not touched). Jordan could sign an extension, seeing as he’s in the final year of his contract, rather than doing a standard restructure which would leave a lot of dead money behind if he isn’t re-upped in 2024.

The Saints still have options. And that’s just how their salary cap guru Khai Harley likes it — he designs contracts with players to have all of these levers and mechanisms to work with years in advance, giving New Orleans salary cap flexibility that few teams can weaponize as effectively. Hopefully the Saints can get in the clear soon and open up more resources to put towards improving their roster when free agency kicks off on March 15.

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Saints have 4 players accounting for $5 million in dead money for 2023

The New Orleans Saints have four players accounting for $5 million in dead money for 2023, but that number could soon increase five or six times over:

There’s a lot of work to be done in getting the new Orleans Saints under the 2023 salary cap, but don’t blame players no longer on the roster. For once, the Saints don’t have many dead money commitments from past retirements and roster mistakes — just four players are on the books right now who won’t be playing for New Orleans in the fall. As things currently stand, they won’t have any dead money leftover at all in 2024. It’s the healthiest this area of the operation has been in years.

But it won’t last. While the Saints are forfeiting $5,038,479 right now in dead money (per Over The Cap), that number could increase five times over in just a few weeks should a couple of free agents sign with other teams. And any players designated as post-June 1 cuts will factor into the 2024 salary cap mathematics. Let’s break it down:

Ryan Ramczyk, Marshon Lattimore among top Saints restructure candidates

Ryan Ramczyk and Marshon Lattimore are among top Saints restructure candidates. The next players in line to help the team open up salary cap space:

The New Orleans Saints are still over the salary cap by more than $55 million after restructuring their contract with veteran safety Marcus Maye this week, so it’s clear that they have a lot of work to do a month ahead of free agency. And they will continue to lean on their restructure strategy to open up salary cap resources and keep their best players in town.

So who are the top candidates to be restructured next? Many of these contracts are designed with future moves in mind, so it’s not too difficult to scout ahead and guess at which players will rework their deals in the coming days and weeks. Here’s a quick survey, using contract data from Over The Cap:

Bleacher Report suggests a bold trade sending Cameron Jordan to the Seahawks

Bleacher Report suggested a bold trade sending Saints defensive end Cameron Jordan to the Seahawks, which would leave New Orleans with $23 million in dead money:

Everyone has their take on what the New Orleans Saints should do this offseason — including Cameron Jordan, who ended his offseason social media hiatus to lobby for his team’s pursuit of former Las Vegas Raiders quarterback Derek Carr. But what if Jordan himself goes on the move? Would trading him be a consideration?

The latest proposal comes from Bleacher Report’s Alex Ballentine, who suggests the Saints could kick off a rebuild by trading Jordan to the Seattle Seahawks in exchange for a second-round pick in 2023 and a third rounder in 2024.

On the one hand, that’s strong value for an aging player. It would put the Saints on the board three times in a 23-slot span this April, and it would return the third-round pick they sent to the Denver Broncos next year. New Orleans would go on the clock at Nos. 29 (first round), 41 and 53 (second round), plus 72 (third round) through the first two nights of the 2023 draft. That’s appealing, but it isn’t enough.

And on the other hand, this doesn’t help the Saints out financially. They would be left with a $23.4 million dead money payout for Jordan that might otherwise go to different players. Trading him saves only $2.2 million against the salary cap. It’s in their interest to either restructure Jordan’s contract or sign him to a new deal this spring, saving more than $10.6 million while keeping a top defender in the lineup.

And offloading Jordan like this could be hazardous for the state of their defensive line. Starters David Onyemata and Marcus Davenport are both free agents, as is top backup Tanoh Kpassagnon and every other defensive tackle who got into a game for New Orleans last year. The Saints badly need Jordan’s stable presence in the defensive front while renovating the unit around him. That’s to say nothing of Jordan’s value to the team as a leader and steadying presence in the locker room.

Maybe a first-round pick would be worth it (and Seattle owns two of them, at Nos. 5 and 20) but it’s very unlikely the Seahawks would trade those kinds of assets for a 33-year-old pass rusher. Given the salary cap penalties involved, there probably isn’t a realistic price the Saints could find an interested team to agree to in trading for Jordan at this point in the offseason. Playoff hopefuls like Seattle will need to look elsewhere to cure what ails them.

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How the Saints can get under the salary cap and make room for Derek Carr

How can the New Orleans Saints can get under the salary cap and afford Raiders quarterback Derek Carr? It won’t be easy, but it can be done, via @RossJacksonNOLA:

Over the recent years, the New Orleans Saints have been at the center of salary cap talk due to their sizable financial overages. The 2023 season will not be an exception. The NFL announced that the league’s salary cap would be set at $224.8 million. While the amount is an all-time high and represents a rebound to the pre-pandemic trajectory, the Saints will be right back in the thick of things trying to trim back a deficit of over $60 million as projected by Over The Cap. Believe it or not, New Orleans can get below that overage by more than enough to land a big-fish quarterback this offseason.

With veteran quarterback Derek Carr certainly on the move this offseason, his ties to Saints head coach Dennis Allen lead many to believe that he will find his way to New Orleans. Many will ask “How can the Saints afford him?”, the perennial question of any offseason in the Big Easy. The answer is simple, they keep going with their usual offseason approach. It is more than possible for them to make room for Carr (about $32.9 million), who is visiting them on Wednesday, and inherently Lamar Jackson as well if he is tagged and traded (roughly $32.4 million). Here’s an idea of how the Saints could get it done:

NFL sets 2023 salary cap at record-high $224.8M, which is great for the Saints

The NFL has set its 2023 salary cap at a record-high $224.8 million, which is great news for the New Orleans Saints — who are over the cap by more than $57 million:

Good news, everyone: the NFL told teams Monday that it has set the 2023 salary cap per team at $224.8 million, which is great for the New Orleans Saints. New Orleans currently has a staggering $281.9 million in cap commitments for the 2023 season, which means they must clear more than $57.1 million to reach cap compliance before the start of the new league year on March 14. No team is over the cap by a wider margin than the Saints.

That’s easier said than done, but we’ve seen New Orleans work around the cap well before, and they’ll get there again. It’s going to be another busy offseason for their salary cap specialist Khai Harley and general manager Mickey Loomis as they navigate contract situations with many players and we should anticipate restructures, releases, and a couple of creative extensions to reach the finish line.

Some obvious moves that jump out at you from their accounting sheet: restructures with cornerstone players like Marshon Lattimore (saving over $10 million), Ryan Ramczyk ($9.6 million), and Erik McCoy ($8 million) will be easy enough and cut into that negative cap figure. Parting ways with Jameis Winston and Wil Lutz brings $8.1 million in savings. Releasing Michael Thomas and Andrus Peat with post-June 1 designations frees up another $12.9 million later in the summer, but that’s well after free agency’s busiest signing period and the 2023 draft, so it isn’t quite as helpful.

Still, those moves leave the Saints in the red by about $21.4 million before the March deadline. They clearly have more work to do than we’ve mused on here. So watch this space in the weeks ahead as roster moves and salary cap maneuvers trickle in.

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Jameis Winston, Andrus Peat among potential Saints cap cuts in 2023 offseason

Jameis Winston and Andrus Peat are among the top potential Saints salary cap cut candidates during the 2023 offseason:

No team has more work to do in managing their salary cap commitments than the New Orleans Saints this offseason — depending on where you source your information, they’re in the red by margins of between $53 and $57 million. That means some talent is going to be leaving in the spring as the Saints look to cut costs, get younger, and frankly get more bang for their buck.

We’ve already listed the team’s biggest salary cap hits for 2023. Here are five areas where the Saints could free up some resources and look for upgrades:

10 biggest cap hits for the Saints heading into 2023 offseason

Cameron Jordan and Marshon Lattimore carry the biggest New Orleans Saints salary cap hits ahead of the 2023 season, but that will change soon. Their top 10:

The New Orleans Saints are in a tight spot. They finished the 2022 season with a 7-10 record after rallying to win 3 of their last 4 games under Dennis Allen’s first year as their head coach. They don’t own a pick in the first round of the 2023 draft, and depending on where you look, they’re projected to sit over the 2023 salary cap by $53 to $57 million.

So they have a lot of work to do, but that’s the case every year. Some veterans will be let go, others will restructure their contracts to move money around, and a few will sign lucrative extensions as the Saints work to reach salary cap compliance and open up resources to add new talent. It’s the same as it ever was.

With the Saints’ 2022 season in the books, we’re shifting gears to look at their top 10 cap hits for 2023 (numbers via Spotrac):