How can we create cap space right now?

Obviously a big trade doesn't seem to be in the cards but we also need more emergency cap room for other small acquisitions?

Who can we extend or restructure to make that happen?

Didn't realize it was that bad.

Other than cuts, a Van Noy extension seems the easiest. Young enough that a good sized extension wouldn't end up as a bad contract but his cap hit is $5.125M. Of that, $4.2M is salary. We could save a couple million by extending him and moving salary to signing bonus. The other big savers I see are guys like D. McCourtey and Hightower who are old enough that doing the same thing could look bad 2-3 years out. Devin has a $9M salary, though, if he and Bill think there's two more good years left, there's big savings there too.

Extension for one out of DMac, HT, KVN maybe even Bennett. Potentially also Cannon or Harmon.

The first three make the most sense.

SBLIII said:

Obviously a big trade doesn't seem to be in the cards but we also need more emergency cap room for other small acquisitions?

Who can we extend or restructure to make that happen?

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I don't think we need to make a big deal out of cap space in 2019.

Pats can create cap space in about 5 minutes by guaranteeing current deals and amortizing the bonus into 2020 and beyond.

Just gotta do that with the right player (KVN, etc)

Let's be clear. Restructuring KVN produces no cap room. Restructures are changes in contract over the same period, usually for the same compensation. Most often current year salaries beyond the minimum are moved to a new bonus.
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KVN is in his last season wand would need to be extended, a fine idea BTW.
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We can all and compare how much can be readily created by restructures.
EDIT: $3.3M Hightower
2.6M Mason
1.0M Harmon
1.1M White
$8.0M subtotal (there are additional smaller opportunities)

robertweathers said:

I don't think we need to make a big deal out of cap space in 2019.

Pats can create cap space in about 5 minutes by guaranteeing current deals and amortizing the bonus into 2020 and beyond.

Just gotta do that with the right player (KVN, etc)

Click to expand...

mgteich said:

Let's be clear. Restructuring KVN produces no cap room. Restructures are changes in contract over the same period, usually for the same compensation. Most often current year salaries beyond the minimum are moved to a new bonus.
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KVN is in his last season wand would need to be extended, a fine idea BTW.
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We can all and compare how much can be readily created by restructures.

Click to expand...

Yea I think you are right. The time to make space for KVN was in the summer in which he had ~$875k in bonuses to be paid out plus the $265k per game check he is receiving.

That being said, your primary point was correct. A call to Hightower's agent and to Mason's could produce $5.9M in cap space without changing the end of their contracts, their guarantees after 2019 and without changing their total compensation. This is about what is needed for normal minor replacements and other in-season costs.

A serious trade would require an extension to Van Noy, Hightower and/or Devin McCourty.

All this is doable. IMO, what we shouldn't do is to expect to use restructures for a major acquisition without first extending at least one of the players.

robertweathers said:

Yea I think you are right. The time to make space for KVN was in the summer in which he had ~$875k in bonuses to be paid out plus the $265k per game check he is receiving.

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mgteich said:

That being said, your primary point was correct. A call to Hightower's agent and to Mason's could produce $5.9M in cap space without changing the end of their contracts, their guarantees after 2019 and without changing their total compensation. This is about what is needed for normal minor replacements and other in-season costs.

A serious trade would require an extension to Van Noy, Hightower and/or Devin McCourty.

All this is doable. IMO, what we shouldn't do is to expect to use restructures for a major acquisition without first extending at least one of the players.

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Speculating here but I think they wanted to do something with High and DMC but at reasonable $. Not happening.

The JJ extension was key. Drafting JuJuan was also key

robertweathers said:

Speculating here but I think they wanted to do something with High and DMC but at reasonable $. Not happening.

The JJ extension was key. Drafting JuJuan was also key

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Unfortunately no leverage with HT and DMC. Next year different with HT

SBLIII said:

Obviously a big trade doesn't seem to be in the cards but we also need more emergency cap room for other small acquisitions?

Who can we extend or restructure to make that happen?

Click to expand...

Simple...wait for the eventual hammer to fall on Clowntonio.

captain stone said:

Simple...wait for the eventual hammer to fall on Clowntonio.

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can we cut AB if he goes on the exempt and get the cap room back? Is there something along the lines in his contract?

SBLIII said:

can we cut AB if he goes on the exempt and get the cap room back? Is there something along the lines in his contract?

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I don't know....but I really hope there is.

luuked said:

Extension for one out of DMac, HT, KVN maybe even Bennett. Potentially also Cannon or Harmon.

The first three make the most sense.

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They're not going to be able to free up much money with Bennett.. MAYBE 1.5M at best..

HT - would be easiest as they could guarantee the rest of his salary and push 2.5M into next season. If they did an extension, they could increase that amount even more.

DMac - a 2 year extension can free as much as 5.3M if you guarantee 7.97M of his salary.

KVN - probably frees up about 3M this season with a 2 year extension and guaranteeing $3.445M of his salary

Bye Thanks Dad

mgteich said:

Let's be clear. Restructuring KVN produces no cap room. Restructures are changes in contract over the same period, usually for the same compensation. Most often current year salaries beyond the minimum are moved to a new bonus.

Click to expand...

Are you saying restructuring specifically KVN produces no cap room or restructuring in general produces no cap room? Because the latter is not true. Even keeping contract length and total comp the same, a restructure can create current year cap room depending on the specifics of the contract to be restructured.

Simple example - player has a 3 year contract that pays him $10 mil straight salary a year. Restructure this year into $1mil salary and $9mil signing bonus. The cap hit for the current year drops from $10mil to $4mil (and the hit for each of the next two years rises from $10mil to $13mil).

The restructure of KVN produces no cap room.

QuantumMechanic said:

Are you saying restructuring specifically KVN produces no cap room or restructuring in general produces no cap room? Because the latter is not true. Even keeping contract length and total comp the same, a restructure can create current year cap room depending on the specifics of the contract to be restructured.

Simple example - player has a 3 year contract that pays him $10 mil straight salary a year. Restructure this year into $1mil salary and $9mil signing bonus. The cap hit for the current year drops from $10mil to $4mil (and the hit for each of the next two years rises from $10mil to $13mil).

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There's no way to free up cap space to get Williams or Ramsey. Patriots simply can't afford either of them.

Patstastic said:

There's no way to free up cap space to get Williams or Ramsey. Patriots simply can't afford either of them.

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If you're wondering about doing so for a player like Trent Williams or Jalen Ramsey (latter seems highly unlikely), I have to ask... has any team, let alone the Pats, ever reworked 3 or 4 contracts mid-season just to make millions of dollars in room to trade for 1 player?

I think we just did.