This has been thoroughly discussed on this board. Your numbers are wrong.
I can't even believe you're pursuing this when you very well know Thuney's contract was guaranteed when he signed it so there was no way we were cutting him whether we signed Brady or not.
If we needed to, we would have cut a host of people who would have cleared $16m off the cap. Cannon alone would have given us a huge chunk. Adrian Phillips would have gotten us to $16m with Cannon. But then add Beau Allen, Brandon Bolden, Matt Lacosse, Brandon King, Dan Vitale, Akeem Spence, etc., and we're in the upper 20ms with space. Now we haven't even discussed Brady's dead money hit from last year. So you're not even counting Brady's cap hit correctly. It would have been $20m - Brady's dead money. Significantly less than $20m. The $20m would be divided evenly with the 1 year extension into 2021.
But beyond that, we wouldn't taken on a bunch of new contracts from players that never helped us.
Once again, BB offered Brady AFTER Thuney was franchised.
This is an incontrovertible fact.
Patriots also finished with
$20,331,213 in cap space.
You are conflating guys who were signed during the 2020 free agency and guys who were already under contract. Out of your list, Phillips, Allen, and Vitale were signed during free agency. Spence and Carl Davis were mid-season signings due to injuries. Phillips only cost 2.2M against the 2020 cap. Cannon accounted for 7.5M against the 2020 cap until he Opted out. So I'm not sure how you're getting to "almost $16M" for the two of them.. You don't even make it to $10M with Phillips and Cannon.
LaCosse, King, and Bolden were already under contract prior to the 2020 Free Agency. LaCosse and Bolden opted out. King was on IR all year.
Please list all the players besides Allen and Vitale that were signed that ate up cap room that never helped us..
What the Patriots FINISHED with has ZERO bearing on what they started with because, at one point after Brady had gone elsewhere, they were at less than $1M in free cap space. They only got SOME money from the AB grievance settlement and the AH situation in MAY. The remaining money came in July when the 8 opt-outs occurred. And Vitale is the only FA signing who "opted out".
Did you stop to think of any of the ramifications of any of the "cuts" / " not signing" you're suggesting?
Adrian Phillips - We'd have been left with Terry Brooks taking a lion-share of the snaps until Dugger was healthy.. Brooks makes Richards look like a capable safety. Brady wouldn't be able to cover up that huge of a whole on the defense.
Allen - Considering where the Pats were drafting, they weren't going to add a capable NT. Then what? You couldn't have foreseen in March that Allen was going to hurt his foot in May and be lost for the season.
LaCosse - You cut him and you're down to just IZZO on the team heading into the Draft. Is that really a sound move? Doesn't it signal to other teams that you are going to be desperate for a TE and then it would jack up the price for trading..
Bolden - A big-time special team player. He burned the Pats when they let him go for the year. It's why they were quick to re-sign him in 2019. If he hadn't opted out, he'd have gotten regular snaps after Burkhead went down.
Cannon - Cutting him would have left the team with Eleumenor, Cunningham, and Cajuste. It would have likely forced them to draft a OT prospect HIGHER than they did in Onwenu and Herron. Would losing Onwenu be worth cutting Cannon?
Now. You keep saying that it's an "incontrovertible fact" that the Patriots Franchised Thuney before they went to Brady. You're wrong. BB and Brady had a phone call on February 28th in regards to a contract. Thuney wasn't Franchised until March 16th.
Here are March 13th articles. The first one mentioning the talks between Brady 2 and BB weeks prior:
The chances of Tom Brady resigning with the New England Patriots before he enters the free agency market next week are not looking good after a report emerged Friday that head coach Bill Belichick offered him a lackluster deal during a phone call earlier this month.
www.foxnews.com
And here is are March 14th article saying that Brady was offered a contract "recently":
The Patriots offered a one-year deal with less value compared to what Brady earned last season.
us.blastingnews.com
A new report sheds light on the contract numbers Tom Brady and Bill Belichick discussed during their recent phone call.
www.nbcboston.com
And here is the March 16th article mentioning they Tagged Thuney:
The Patriots will be using their franchise tag on Joe Thuney.
boston.cbslocal.com
So, if you have information that they Patriots didn't sent an offer until after the 16th, Please share.