2023: Continued dead cap hell (Currently $54 Million)

[Iggles_Phan]

11 hours ago, HazletonEagle said:

NFL teams losing excellent players as cap casualties.

AJ Brown, James Bradberry, and Gardner-Johnson.

Eagles always in position to snag those players. Eagles fans complain about cap hell for like 3 years straight.

Man, the eagles version of cap hell really sucks. To be able to add all of these good players.... God our GM must suck.

 

Brown and Gardner-Johnson weren't cap casualties.  Brown was a case of them not wanting to pay what he wanted to be paid... probably due to his injury history.   Gardner-Johnson was a guy they wanted to extend, but couldn't agree on a price.   It will be interesting to see what the Eagles end up doing with him.  No mention of an extension yet.  And does he get paid like a nickel DB or as a S.    Big questions still there.

And Bradberry was a cap casualty, but he counts just $2.7M this year.  He counts nearly $5M next year.   Kicking the can... again.

[HazletonEagle]

2 minutes ago, paco said:

I missed the point of the thread I created?

 

 

Yeah

 Good one. Let's just pretend you just made this simply for posting information and haven't been using it to be critical of the way you think Howie has mismanaged the cap.

The thread you created is just one of many idiotic threads that have existed in TATE.

Maybe this wasn't the original intent of your thread but it's what it has become. 

 

[paco]

Just now, HazletonEagle said:

Yeah

 Good one. Let's just pretend you just made this simply for posting information and haven't been using it to be critical of the way you think Howie has mismanaged the cap.

The thread you created is just one of many idiotic threads that have existed in TATE.

Maybe this wasn't the original intent of your thread but it's what it has become. 

 

OK NEPAn

[HazletonEagle]

2 minutes ago, Iggles_Phan said:

Brown and Gardner-Johnson weren't cap casualties.  Brown was a case of them not wanting to pay what he wanted to be paid... probably due to his injury history.   Gardner-Johnson was a guy they wanted to extend, but couldn't agree on a price.   It will be interesting to see what the Eagles end up doing with him.  No mention of an extension yet.  And does he get paid like a nickel DB or as a S.    Big questions still there.

And Bradberry was a cap casualty, but he counts just $2.7M this year.  He counts nearly $5M next year.   Kicking the can... again.

Because cap.

Because cap.

 

Very disingenuous post.

 

[jsb235]

1 minute ago, paco said:

I missed the point of the thread I created?

 

 

I think both things can be true. The Eagles do have large amounts of dead cap, obviously. But they also have been able to keep adding talent by restructuring deals, the infamous "kick the can down the road," strategy, because it makes sense to do so since the cap keeps going up. 

No one is wrong. And it's not like the Eagles are going to bankrupt like a game of monopoly.

[Iggles_Phan]

2 minutes ago, HazletonEagle said:

Because cap.

Because cap.

 

Very disingenuous post.

 

Not 'because cap'... because injuries... and because positional disagreement in value.

It's not just because the Titans were squeezed against the cap, nor were the Saints with CGJ.   It was more a question of what they placed as the value of those players... and we STILL don't know what CGJ's extension will be, or even if they will give him one.  Nothing leaking about that right now.

But, when you have the cheapest QB room in the NFL... there is greater flexibility for some things.  Sadly, the cheap QB room comes at a different cost.

[paco]

7 minutes ago, jsb235 said:

I think both things can be true. The Eagles do have large amounts of dead cap, obviously. But they also have been able to keep adding talent by restructuring deals, the infamous "kick the can down the road," strategy, because it makes sense to do so since the cap keeps going up. 

No one is wrong. And it's not like the Eagles are going to bankrupt like a game of monopoly.

While I agree, HE has been trying to use pretty much ANY signing as a gotcha moment as if the claim is that they couldn't sign anyone ever. 

 

He also tried to claim that this was some new (it's not) master strategy (it's not) that allows us to do more with the cap than other teams (It doesn't).  And when showing him a graph that show current cap space and what the absolute max each team could do (the Eagles fell to the bottom VERY quickly in that scenario) he very quickly showed that he doesn't understand basic cap concepts and then when pushed further quickly dismissed it.  It's actually a funny back and forth to go through, if you have the time.

 

I'm still trying to figure out if he's really that ignorant or just trying to troll.  I'm leaning toward the latter.  

[BirdsFanBill]

Pretty sure the entire purpose of having salary cap room is to sign high impact Free Agents and to retain your good young talent. 

Who was the last young talented player to leave us in Free Agency because we couldn't get a deal done with no cap space?

We have added numerous big time FA the last few years regardless of this supposed cap hell. 

I think some people just look for ish to whine about. Who cares about having the most cap space in the league every year.

 

Right now our only limitation is that we probably cannot offer Jalen Hurts a gigantic QB deal, or sign an old FA QB to a huge deal either. The eagles strategy seems to be to draft a young affordable QB and build a roster around the QB.

[Aerolithe_Lion]

4 minutes ago, BirdsFanBill said:

Right now our only limitation is that we probably cannot offer Jalen Hurts a gigantic QB deal, or sign an old FA QB to a huge deal either. The eagles strategy seems to be to draft a young affordable QB and build a roster around the QB.

Even then I think Howie can pull that off.

Hurts is in year 3 of 4 on his rookie deal, so any contract he signs won’t kick in until 2024. And even then we can backload it, making the first year a much lower cap hit, or even the first two years if its long enough to handle it (6 year deal?). Then you’re looking at the first major cap hit in 2026.

Not saying he’s worth it or we’d want to do it, but the cap gives you flexibility options

[HazletonEagle]

10 minutes ago, Iggles_Phan said:

Not 'because cap'... because injuries... and because positional disagreement in value.

It's not just because the Titans were squeezed against the cap, nor were the Saints with CGJ.   It was more a question of what they placed as the value of those players... and we STILL don't know what CGJ's extension will be, or even if they will give him one.  Nothing leaking about that right now.

But, when you have the cheapest QB room in the NFL... there is greater flexibility for some things.  Sadly, the cheap QB room comes at a different cost.

Why do they have a walk away number? Because cap.

Why can the Eagles pay them? Because Howie knows more than the guys in the thread that try to say he is wrong. 

[paco]

 I'm gonna have to start my work day in the next few mins, so I''ll try to come back later with more of my thoughts\position  

2 minutes ago, BirdsFanBill said:

Pretty sure the entire purpose of having salary cap room is to sign high impact Free Agents and to retain your good young talent. 

Yes, but my concern is more around cap flexibility.  I've said this multiple times but when you structure in this manner, it can have a lot of negative side effects.  It can force you to hold on to a player for too long (Alshon) is the one I focus on the most.  He took up a large chunk of space and were forced to hold on to him because of the contract structured you incur an even larger hit, preventing you from signing other players.  This is where the "I THOUGHT YOU SAID WE COULDN'T SIGN ANYONE" crowd gets confused.  When you can't make room or move on from ineffective players, that's money tied up that can be used elsewhere, which is quite different than saying we don't have money to sign folks.

This style of cap management magnifies the pain of any bad contract.

  

2 minutes ago, BirdsFanBill said:

Who was the last young talented player to leave us in Free Agency because we couldn't get a deal done with no cap space?

Good question.  None come to mind at the moment.  

However, it feels like things have changed quite a bit.  This isnt like in the early 2000s where a player hits FA and you read about the bidding wars.  Most players are re-upped or traded prior, like AJ Brown.  I think the legal tampering period has changed the game quite a bit.

 

  

2 minutes ago, BirdsFanBill said:

We have added numerous big time FA the last few years regardless of this supposed cap hell. 

Yes, we have.  And its almost ALWAYS using the void years structure with a tiny cap hit on year 1 to squeeze them in, keeping the cycle that I am critical\concerned about going. 

 

Other teams are able to sign\extend players to huge contracts without jumping through hoops with void years.  Look at Kyler Murray's monster contract:

ear	Age	Base Salary	Prorated Bonus	Roster Bonus	Per Game Roster Bonus	Workout Bonus		Guaranteed Salary		Cap Number	Cap %		Dead Money & Cap Savings Cut (pre-June 1)Cut (post-June 1)Trade (pre-June 1)Trade (post-June 1)RestructureExtension
2022	25	$965,000	$11,704,481	$0	$0	$0		$965,000		$12,669,481	6.1%		$109,197,481	($96,528,000)
2023	26	$2,000,000	$13,007,000	$0	$0	$1,000,000		$2,000,000		$16,007,000	7.1%		$96,528,000	($80,521,000)
2024 📝	27	$37,000,000	$13,007,000	$0	$850,000	$1,000,000		$35,300,000		$51,857,000	20.3%		$81,521,000	($29,664,000)
2025 📝	28	$18,000,000	$13,007,000	$11,900,000	$850,000	$1,857,500		$0		$45,614,500	--		$33,214,000	$12,400,500
2026 📝	29	$22,835,000	$13,007,000	$17,000,000	$850,000	$1,857,500		$0		$55,549,500	--		$20,207,000	$35,342,500
2027 📝	30	$19,500,000	$7,200,000	$14,185,000	$850,000	$1,800,000		$0		$43,535,000	--		$7,200,000	$36,335,000
2028	31	$34,007,360	$0	$9,700,000	$850,000	$1,800,000		$0		$46,357,360	--		$0	$46,357,360

 

No void years.  Can cut\trade with savings after 2024 (or 2023 if using Post June 1s).  They can do this because they aren't mortgaged to the hilt.

  

[BirdsFanBill]

10 minutes ago, paco said:

 I'm gonna have to start my work day in the next few mins, so I''ll try to come back later with more of my thoughts\position  

Yes, but my concern is more around cap flexibility.  I've said this multiple times but when you structure in this manner, it can have a lot of negative side effects.  It can force you to hold on to a player for too long (Alshon) is the one I focus on the most.  He took up a large chunk of space and were forced to hold on to him because of the contract structured you incur an even larger hit, preventing you from signing other players.  This is where the "I THOUGHT YOU SAID WE COULDN'T SIGN ANYONE" crowd gets confused.  When you can't make room or move on from ineffective players, that's money tied up that can be used elsewhere, which is quite different than saying we don't have money to sign folks.

This style of cap management magnifies the pain of any bad contract.

  

Good question.  None come to mind at the moment.  

However, it feels like things have changed quite a bit.  This isnt like in the early 2000s where a player hits FA and you read about the bidding wars.  Most players are re-upped or traded prior, like AJ Brown.  I think the legal tampering period has changed the game quite a bit.

 

  

Yes, we have.  And its almost ALWAYS using the void years structure with a tiny cap hit on year 1 to squeeze them in, keeping the cycle that I am critical\concerned about going. 

 

Other teams are able to sign\extend players to huge contracts without jumping through hoops with void years.  Look at Kyler Murray's monster contract:

ear	Age	Base Salary	Prorated Bonus	Roster Bonus	Per Game Roster Bonus	Workout Bonus		Guaranteed Salary		Cap Number	Cap %		Dead Money & Cap Savings Cut (pre-June 1)Cut (post-June 1)Trade (pre-June 1)Trade (post-June 1)RestructureExtension
2022	25	$965,000	$11,704,481	$0	$0	$0		$965,000		$12,669,481	6.1%		$109,197,481	($96,528,000)
2023	26	$2,000,000	$13,007,000	$0	$0	$1,000,000		$2,000,000		$16,007,000	7.1%		$96,528,000	($80,521,000)
2024 📝	27	$37,000,000	$13,007,000	$0	$850,000	$1,000,000		$35,300,000		$51,857,000	20.3%		$81,521,000	($29,664,000)
2025 📝	28	$18,000,000	$13,007,000	$11,900,000	$850,000	$1,857,500		$0		$45,614,500	--		$33,214,000	$12,400,500
2026 📝	29	$22,835,000	$13,007,000	$17,000,000	$850,000	$1,857,500		$0		$55,549,500	--		$20,207,000	$35,342,500
2027 📝	30	$19,500,000	$7,200,000	$14,185,000	$850,000	$1,800,000		$0		$43,535,000	--		$7,200,000	$36,335,000
2028	31	$34,007,360	$0	$9,700,000	$850,000	$1,800,000		$0		$46,357,360	--		$0	$46,357,360

 

No void years.  Can cut\trade with savings after 2024 (or 2023 if using Post June 1s).  They can do this because they aren't mortgaged to the hilt.

  

I understand what you mean. Is the negative argument with this strategy that one day we will have to pay the piper? I guess I just have been reading about one day having to pay the piper for years now and never actually seeing it happen.

 

My point is that no matter how you look at the cap strategy, the eagles have somehow been able to pretty consistently put out a competitive roster every year, and quickly rebound after down years. I just have not seen these apparent huge negative effects that are one day going to arrive from "kicking the can down the road". If the road never ends, who gives a F

[jsb235]

8 minutes ago, BirdsFanBill said:

I understand what you mean. Is the negative argument with this strategy that one day we will have to pay the piper? I guess I just have been reading about one day having to pay the piper for years now and never actually seeing it happen.

 

My point is that no matter how you look at the cap strategy, the eagles have somehow been able to pretty consistently put out a competitive roster every year, and quickly rebound after down years. I just have not seen these apparent huge negative effects that are one day going to arrive from "kicking the can down the road". If the road never ends, who gives a F

Think of it like a mortgage. If you pay off your house all at once, you have more flexibility down the road, but you can't pay Amari Cooper. 

If you take out a mortgage, you can go and buy an AJ Brown, but have less flexibility over time.

And, i should add, we keep refinancing. So that further limits us. 

[Aerolithe_Lion]

4 minutes ago, jsb235 said:

Think of it like a mortgage. If you pay off your house all at once, you have more flexibility down the road, but you can't pay Amari Cooper. 

If you take out a mortgage, you can go and buy an AJ Brown, but have less flexibility over time.

And, i should add, we keep refinancing. So that further limits us. 

But with a mortgage there’s a drawback: interest rates.

 

We have the opposite here, our spending capital gets bigger once the mortgage bills are due

[Hawkeye]

57 minutes ago, BirdsFanBill said:

Pretty sure the entire purpose of having salary cap room is to sign high impact Free Agents and to retain your good young talent. 

Who was the last young talented player to leave us in Free Agency because we couldn't get a deal done with no cap space?

We have added numerous big time FA the last few years regardless of this supposed cap hell. 

I think some people just look for ish to whine about. Who cares about having the most cap space in the league every year.

 

Right now our only limitation is that we probably cannot offer Jalen Hurts a gigantic QB deal, or sign an old FA QB to a huge deal either. The eagles strategy seems to be to draft a young affordable QB and build a roster around the QB.

Great question.  Who was the last ascendant player they wanted to keep but couldn't make it work under the cap?  Spoiler alert: there hasn't been one in years.  I can't even think of one off the top of my head since Dawk and a cynic would say that was more of a cultural loss than on-field by that point in his career.  Same with Jenkins. 

The whole point of the cap is to keep kicking it down the road.  It's designed by the league to allow teams to push money into later years when there's more to spend.  The only time it's been an issue was when the league shut down because of COVID and the cap actually shrank, which is an outlier.  And nobody is better at navigating that than Howie.

[Iggles_Phan]

1 hour ago, HazletonEagle said:

Why do they have a walk away number? Because cap.

Why can the Eagles pay them? Because Howie knows more than the guys in the thread that try to say he is wrong. 

Why did Eagles trade Ertz?  cap.
Why did they restructure Cox?  cap.

Howie isn't immune from having to do things based on cap issues.   On the contrary, his cap issues painted him into some tight corners, and really only has dug out due to moving to a super cheap QB.

[HazletonEagle]

2 minutes ago, Iggles_Phan said:

Why did Eagles trade Ertz?  cap.
Why did they restructure Cox?  cap.

Howie isn't immune from having to do things based on cap issues.   On the contrary, his cap issues painted him into some tight corners, and really only has dug out due to moving to a super cheap QB.

every  move is a cap move. We capitalize on other teams cap mistakes. Because we are the in the opposite of any actual cap hell despite whatever you guys think your numbers show. 

[CouchKing]

What happens to the cap and the team if we need to extend Hurts?

Do we need to shed starting talent? Restructure contracts and the team?

[jsb235]

24 minutes ago, Hawkeye said:

Great question.  Who was the last ascendant player they wanted to keep but couldn't make it work under the cap?  Spoiler alert: there hasn't been one in years.  I can't even think of one off the top of my head since Dawk and a cynic would say that was more of a cultural loss than on-field by that point in his career.  Same with Jenkins. 

The whole point of the cap is to keep kicking it down the road.  It's designed by the league to allow teams to push money into later years when there's more to spend.  The only time it's been an issue was when the league shut down because of COVID and the cap actually shrank, which is an outlier.  And nobody is better at navigating that than Howie.

Bad drafting has also played a large part in this. 

[jsb235]

1 minute ago, CouchKing said:

What happens to the cap and the team if we need to extend Hurts?

Do we need to shed starting talent? Restructure contracts and the team?

If they extend Hurts, they have extra high picks to add talent. 

If they use those picks on a qb, there will be cap space to add free agents. 

[Guest]

Just now, jsb235 said:

If they extend Hurts, they have extra high picks to add talent. 

If they use those picks on a qb, there will be cap space to add free agents. 

I vote for the bolded option.

[Alpha_TATEr]

someone is really enjoying the smell of his own farts right now. 

must have been an all you can eat chilli night at the local nepa shell station. 

 

[Iggles_Phan]

24 minutes ago, HazletonEagle said:

every  move is a cap move. We capitalize on other teams cap mistakes. Because we are the in the opposite of any actual cap hell despite whatever you guys think your numbers show. 

And we also have our own issues with the cap... which is why he had to push so much money from the likes of Brooks, Cox, Ertz, Kelce, Graham to the future.   We did hit cap hell, it was the 2021 season.  That season they added the likes of Anthony Harris, Ryan Kerrigan, et al.  All bottom tier, not good enough free agents and spread the hits over two years to have the privilege.   To act like Howie didn't make a mistake with the cap is to misread the reality.  The Eagles deal with their mistakes differently than other teams.  But, they make them.  

I will say this, Howie navigated the waters of his mistake better than I thought he would.   That said, I still think he should have ripped a few of the band-aids off more quickly than he did... Brooks was done, but he kicked the can on him and we got zero production from him, that extension he signed after the first Achilles was a major mistake.  It was a calculated risk, and it blew up in his face.  But, it was forced on him a bit by his effort to try to extend the window after 2017, trouble was, he wasn't reading the situation correctly.

 

But, Howie turned this around more quickly than I thought he could.  That said, I think the biggest hurdle and the hardest one still remains... then the follow-up to that would be how to maintain talent on the roster without having the luxury of a cheap QB room.  We'll see what happens.

[HazletonEagle]

1 minute ago, Iggles_Phan said:

And we also have our own issues with the cap... which is why he had to push so much money from the likes of Brooks, Cox, Ertz, Kelce, Graham to the future.   We did hit cap hell, it was the 2021 season.  That season they added the likes of Anthony Harris, Ryan Kerrigan, et al.  All bottom tier, not good enough free agents and spread the hits over two years to have the privilege.   To act like Howie didn't make a mistake with the cap is to misread the reality.  The Eagles deal with their mistakes differently than other teams.  But, they make them.  

I will say this, Howie navigated the waters of his mistake better than I thought he would.   That said, I still think he should have ripped a few of the band-aids off more quickly than he did... Brooks was done, but he kicked the can on him and we got zero production from him, that extension he signed after the first Achilles was a major mistake.  It was a calculated risk, and it blew up in his face.  But, it was forced on him a bit by his effort to try to extend the window after 2017, trouble was, he wasn't reading the situation correctly.

 

But, Howie turned this around more quickly than I thought he could.  That said, I think the biggest hurdle and the hardest one still remains... then the follow-up to that would be how to maintain talent on the roster without having the luxury of a cheap QB room.  We'll see what happens.

Unless you think we are actually going to extend Hurts, we are going to continue having a cheap QB for the next 4 years.

The only problem with that is that a rookie likely wont fit the window to win now, with this ridiculously good roster. 

[Iggles_Phan]

Just now, HazletonEagle said:

Unless you think we are actually going to extend Hurts, we are going to continue having a cheap QB for the next 4 years.

The only problem with that is that a rookie likely wont fit the window to win now, with this ridiculously good roster. 

Fortunately, most rookie QBs only get to have one rookie season, but I agree.    BTW... I think the roster is good, I wouldn't say 'ridiculously good'.  

The RB room doesn't impress me.  The safety position is still a bit weak in my mind.  Epps just isn't a guy that I see back there and think "We're set there."  I saw some discussion about how this roster stacks up against 2017.  To me, I can't really find an area of the team that is actually stronger right now than the 2017 version.  Seriously, not a single position group I'd take now over 2017.