OT: Santana Moss extension -- lolz you can do this??

[eom]

ProFootballTalk.com - New Santana Moss Deal Offsets Jansen Cap Charge

this is the kind of devious crap that makes me wonder why I even bother to try to figure salary cap.

New Santana Moss Deal Offsets Jansen Cap Charge
Posted by Mike Florio on June 2, 2009, 8:43 p.m. EDT

A league source tells us that the Washington Redskins quietly extended the contract of receiver Santana Moss last month, creating nearly the same amount of cap space that was burned up when tackle Jon Jansen recently was cut.

Per the source, the Redskins converted his base salary of $3.7 million in 2009 and $4.3 million in 2010 into a signing bonus, less salaries of $745,000 this year and $968,500 next year.

The difference is a guaranteed payment of $6.28 million.

The new deal adds three additional seasons beyond 2010, at base salaries of $1.192 million in 2011, $1.4155 million in 2012, and $1.639 million in 2013. But we’re told that the three new years automatically void at the end of the 2010 season.

So why were the new years added? To allow the guaranteed payment to be spread over five years.

As a result, the total cap savings was $1.7477 million. And the Jansen cap charge was $1.726 million.

There also was a benefit for Moss; he received all of his 2009 pay and most of his 2010 compensation now.

 

[maverick4]

The new deal adds three additional seasons beyond 2010, at base salaries of $1.192 million in 2011, $1.4155 million in 2012, and $1.639 million in 2013. But we’re told that the three new years automatically void at the end of the 2010 season.

How do they become automatically void?

People are starting the mess with the cap the same way Enron and Worldcom messed with accounting rules.

 

[eom]

they just put it in there.

the following are fake years and not to be taken seriously:
2011
2012
2013

 

[Schmo]

How do they become automatically void?

People are starting the mess with the cap the same way Enron and Worldcom messed with accounting rules.

Poison pill themselves?

 

[pats1]

Poison pill themselves?

Pretty much.

 

[jmt57]

I'm a little too tired to figure this out right now, but could it have anything to do with the loophole in the 30 Percent Rule that adamjt13 wrote about a couple of month's ago?

AdamJT13: A loophole around the NFL's 30 Percent Rule

 

[eom]

no.

hopefully one of these resident capologists will correct me if I have this wrong, but they just took 2 years of salary ('09 + '10), lumped it all up in a signing bonus, which is basically like giving the guy an advance on next year's pay, but it gets amortized over the length (5 years) of the contract for cap purposes.

so, after some minimal salary figure (700k, or whatever it was) they're only on the hook for 20% of the signing bonus (for cap purposes) this year, and 20% next year.

but, OH NO! the contract's voided!
this accelerates the remaining 60% of the signing bonus hit into 2010.
which happens to be uncapped.

 

[Pats726]

no.

hopefully one of these resident capologists will correct me if I have this wrong, but they just took 2 years of salary ('09 + '10), lumped it all up in a signing bonus, which is basically like giving the guy an advance on next year's pay, but it gets amortized over the length (5 years) of the contract for cap purposes.

so, after some minimal salary figure (700k, or whatever it was) they're only on the hook for 20% of the signing bonus (for cap purposes) this year, and 20% next year.

but, OH NO! the contract's voided!
this accelerates the remaining 60% of the signing bonus hit into 2010.
which happens to be uncapped.

I think there will be a LOT of things like that with 10 POSSIBLY being uncapped...As of now..it is uncapped, but THAT could change.

 

[Isaac]

I'm skeptical, but if this is indeed legit it could give the Patriots a tool to free up some cap space if needed this year. However, one down-side is that it probably eliminates the ability of the team to use a franchise tag on a player, therefore I doubt they'd do something like this for Brady--there are other players that could be options (e.g. Matt Light, Adalius Thomas).

 

[MoLewisrocks]

How do they become automatically void?

People are starting the mess with the cap the same way Enron and Worldcom messed with accounting rules.

Voidable years have always been available as somewhat of a means to postpone the inevitable. Manning has two at the end of his 7 year deal that was initially a 9 year deal. That gave Polian more room to maneuver in amortizing all those roster bonuses his deal included. Because voidable years while automatic in the sense that whatever service or performance was tied to them is easily achieved do not actually void until they occur. It's a means to stretch the cap but it doesn't come without cost as the dead cap remains after the years are voided.

We could redo Brady's deal with a couple of voidable years. But who wants to face the prospect of Brady as a FA with dead cap?

Sometimes those years are also used to fluff up a contract and make it look bigger than it is for agent spin. Manning's deal was for 9 years and $126M though it will really end up 7 years $98M. The $100M category was probably important for Condon to say he achieved for Manning at the time because guys like Favre and Bledsoe had already achieved that mark (on paper, anyways...).

 

[Pats726]

Voidable years have always been available as somewhat of a means to postpone the inevitable. Manning has two at the end of his 7 year deal that was initially a 9 year deal. That gave Polian more room to maneuver in amortizing all those roster bonuses his deal included. Because voidable years while automatic in the sense that whatever service or performance was tied to them is easily achieved do not actually void until they occur. It's a means to stretch the cap but it doesn't come without cost as the dead cap remains after the years are voided.

We could redo Brady's deal with a couple of voidable years. But who wants to face the prospect of Brady as a FA with dead cap?

Sometimes those years are also used to fluff up a contract and make it look bigger than it is for agent spin. Manning's deal was for 9 years and $126M though it will really end up 7 years $98M. The $100M category was probably important for Condon to say he achieved for Manning at the time because guys like Favre and Bledsoe had already achieved that mark (on paper, anyways...).

Great points about the back ended deals...they have always been used, I'm curious how these and other tactics an dloopholes may help teams skirt around the possible uncapped year?? I mean now, it's a real question mark, maybe leaning a bit toward uncapped, BUT..until there is more momentum one side or the other, I really think teams are doing a lot of fence sitting and finding ways to plan for either. (MORE reason to get it all done early...)