Cap Hell

[Since1960]

If "Cap Hell" was the reason for the stunning inactivity of the team then it's their own fault for creating the financial restraints. But I'm not buying it because there are endless ways of creating space to be active in free agency. The Mason trade being one example... usually you'll see a corresponding move on the other end of something like that. Otherwise you got rid of your best offensive lineman for absolutely no reason.

Perhaps you hadn’t heard - we got our guy - we signed Ty (a bow on it) Montgomery!!

 

[Pats2000]

Chiefs window is open as long as Mahomes is QB. So another 10 years or so. Same for Buffalo. Same for Cincinnati. Maybe Chargers. Jmo. If you've got an elite QB, there's always an open window.

Patriots didn't have a rebuild with Brady between 2003 and 2018. Colts didn't have one with Manning. Packers were consistent playoff contenders with Favre then Rodgers.

Yes every team does eventually pay the piper. But it's usually not going to happen with smart management and coaches.

The QB salaries will continue to explode too.

It's hard to believe. But in 5 years or so, Mahomes may be like the 7th or 8th highest paid QB. That's not necessarily due to there being 6 or 7 better QB's. That's just the market. His salary will seem "Pedestrian".

2006, that was a rebuild year. Reche Caldwel as Pats #1 receiver still gives me nightmares

 

[dtbrks]

Hell? It’s a damn game. I’m in more hell at my real job than any sports franchise. Lol.

 

[JarOfMayo51]

Its almost as if the team didn't spend a quarter of a billion dollars last offseason, with the way people are clamoring for action

 

[PatsFanInVa]

Why does it seem the Patriots are the only team who can't afford to pay players "due to the cap"

"Kraft is cheap" is a silly statement, but yes, the Pats are playing it more conservatively than other organizations. So yes, there is a grain of truth to it.

When a team converts salary to bonus to defer the cap, they have to pony up CASH immediately to pay out that bonus. So all the moves the Saints made this year means that the owner is opening up the wallet big time - right now, as opposed to spreading it down the road.

The VOID years are a terrible tool that will create all kinds of problems, imo, and should not be allowed. The NFL has allowed arms' races where teams can blow through the CAP massively and hang on the edge of a cliff for several years...and in a QB-dominated league (because of rule changes), the teams who feel set there will have to do it to get the big pieces.

As for the pushing of CAP, the example the Pats fans should look at to keep sane is...Stephon Gilmore. Signing a player for a top end deal and pushing the cap means that the end of that deal, which won't be top-end anymore, and you hear things like "Why would Gilmore play for $7 million when so-and-so is making 16?"

Of course, he's not playing for $7 million - it's just that he got gobs of the current year's $$$ early.

So the NFL, by the way they're allowing CAP manipulation, is creating bad situations for lots of teams. This year, NO, Tampa (again), LA (again), Buffalo, the Raiders, the Chargers, and possibly the Bengals* are all in gamble mode. Seemingly, it unbalances the league as much as it used to be when they tried to find some parity...but it also means that these teams are going to eat it big time when the piper calls.

It also creates massive pay disparities around the league, which also will be detrimental. Football isn't basketball, and adding big name pieces doesn't mean as much in the NFL, but it still distorts the game detrimentally.

(Not including the Broncos because they added the centerpiece for years to come, which is a bit different)

You guys must not have watched last offseason.

Here's this year's deal.

Last year we spent a lot. Everybody called it a spending spree. It wasn't just a spending spree by our standards, it was a spending spree by anybody's. We got 25 guys or something, but there were a few notable beneficiaries, including the tight ends, one of whom was worth it, the other of whom isn't... yet.

A lot of that $$$$ was guaranteed, meaning cutting doesn't help, you're committed to paying that amount. You can sell the contract but it's hard to do, because if you want out if it, it's not likely somebody else wants in on it. So why did we do that? Since we're sooooo cheap?

Per some other guy earlier on, because last year was a one time significant CUT in the cap, to be followed by big raises in cap this year and the next. This is expected to cause significant capflation, which is handy, because the way real inflation is going you'll need league minimum just to get a baked potato for dinner every night. I kid. But not much.

Anyhoo, we spent 2021 cap dollars which was the good kind to spend, but that didn't leave us terribly cap flush this year. So if you and your buddies are yackin at the bah about "F***in Kraft that cheap bastid" well, who cares, it ain't hurtin' nobody, unless of course somebody contradicts you and you have to have a go at him after 7 beers and end up punching the wooden indian at the entrance of Cheers or something. Agree that 2023 might be a splashy year, but we'll see. don't forget that, whether you like the results or not, 2021 was a splashy year.

 

[PatsFanInVa]

What if the best time to strike is not when everyone else is going all-in for this season?

Just thinking out loud. Seemingly a ton of teams are kicking cap cans down the road. Maybe the best time to make a big splash and serious run for it is in Mac's third and fourth seasons when he's more developed, still super cheap, and a lot of today's "super teams" are paying the price of going for broke (and there's quite a few of those).

Now I know it's not the kind of stuff anyone wants to hear but... Again, just thinking out loud.

Yes, it was.

And we did.

Some would add "out." (I wouldn't. A lot of the jury's out, and what we've seen has been hit & miss, not a disaster.)

 

[skinnydog]

Its almost as if the team didn't spend a quarter of a billion dollars last offseason, with the way people are clamoring for action

The team had so much cap space and so few players under contract going into free agency they had to spend a ton of money just to fill out their roster.

 

[skinnydog]

You guys must not have watched last offseason.

Here's this year's deal.

Last year we spent a lot. Everybody called it a spending spree. It wasn't just a spending spree by our standards, it was a spending spree by anybody's. We got 25 guys or something, but there were a few notable beneficiaries, including the tight ends, one of whom was worth it, the other of whom isn't... yet.

A lot of that $$$$ was guaranteed, meaning cutting doesn't help, you're committed to paying that amount. You can sell the contract but it's hard to do, because if you want out if it, it's not likely somebody else wants in on it. So why did we do that? Since we're sooooo cheap?

last year’s “spending spree” happened because the team was so far under the cap and had very few players signed for the 2021 season heading into free agency.

 

[Pape]

The Saints were supposed to be in Cap hell this year and somehow got out of it without any cuts. So being cap cost conscious and waiting for the rest of the league to get into cap hell and have to cut or not resign really good players seems like a fools errand. I guess it happens occasionally, but not often.

You really need to go look at the transactions list and actually look at all the manuvering the saints had to do to get under the cap... There were more than several players cut, released and traded to make that happen

 

[Pape]

The VOID years are a terrible tool that will create all kinds of problems, imo, and should not be allowed.

Its going to get to the point where the league will have to rein this practice in... I think we might see it curtailed but not eliminated... like maybe one or two years... Otherwise whats the point in keeping a hard cap?

 

[Pape]

If "Cap Hell" was the reason for the stunning inactivity of the team then it's their own fault for creating the financial restraints. But I'm not buying it because there are endless ways of creating space to be active in free agency. The Mason trade being one example... usually you'll see a corresponding move on the other end of something like that. Otherwise you got rid of your best offensive lineman for absolutely no reason.

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There you go... no need to be miserable here... go to bucks land, someplace where you can go to be happy and speak to like minded people

 

[TheRainMaker]

They won the division from 03-07, and 09-19.

Brady's prime years.

Which years they rebuild?

Note: 2002 they barely missed the postseason. And Brady was hurt in 08.

2005, 2006, 2008, 2009, 2010, 2011, 2013, 2018 and 2019 rosters were pretty bad.

 

[PatsFanInVa]

last year’s “spending spree” happened because the team was so far under the cap and had very few players signed for the 2021 season heading into free agency.

So you think they just made up that strategery story and it's coincidental? You're telling me that Dalton Keane and Devin Asi Asi just lamentably were at the ends of their deals, so we got Hunter Henry and Jonnu Smith at 12.5M APY each, you know, because you need somebody at the position? I'm not actually sure where TF they went, on the team, off the team. Like it mattered.

It was a mix. They did get a huge volume of guys, they also spent a LOT. Some value spends, some spec bets on possible excellers... but everything they did they did knowing that a 2021 cap dollar was going to buy a lot compared with a 2022 dollar or 2023 dollar. I'd even go so far as to say, it's possible that the arrow of causality went at least a little the other direction: In that climate, you try to upgrade more spots, not fewer. When guys are on their last year and did not perform, it militates toward replacing guys, not hanging on to them.

I'm thinking the "because one-time cap deflation" story is the answer.

 

[skinnydog]

So you think they just made up that strategery story and it's coincidental? You're telling me that Dalton Keane and Devin Asi Asi just lamentably were at the ends of their deals, so we got Hunter Henry and Jonnu Smith at 12.5M APY each, you know, because you need somebody at the position? I'm not actually sure where TF they went, on the team, off the team. Like it mattered.

It was a mix. They did get a huge volume of guys, they also spent a LOT. Some value spends, some spec bets on possible excellers... but everything they did they did knowing that a 2021 cap dollar was going to buy a lot compared with a 2022 dollar or 2023 dollar. I'd even go so far as to say, it's possible that the arrow of causality went at least a little the other direction: In that climate, you try to upgrade more spots, not fewer. When guys are on their last year and did not perform, it militates toward replacing guys, not hanging on to them.

I'm thinking the "because one-time cap deflation" story is the answer.

The idea that 2021 cap dollars would buy a lot didn’t pan out did it? Judon is a great signing, but they’ve signed guys like him before. And Hunter Henry? I like him, but it’s not like their master plan to spend in 2021 allowed them to get a pro bowl TE. the reality is that while the Pats had a lot of $ to spend in 2021, other teams were finding ways to keep their free agents and the Pats did not have their pick of a great free agent crop of players. They also spent a lot of those dollars signing their own free agents. I think they did pretty well last year and some signings will be better this year, but its not like the Pat’s we’re so much smarter than the rest of the league that they had the market to themselves last year.

And this year, while the Pats are standing pat multiple top AFC teams are spending to get better. Other teams are spending now to get better now because the cap is going up by a lot in ‘23 and ‘24. The Pats were always smarter than all those other teams that were fiscally imprudent, but that was when their QB was TB. We’ll see how that works now.

 

[rochrist]

Seems like there's a lot more cap manipulation now than even 5-10m years ago. Also, my point was very recently the Saints were about 60 million over the cap and now they are under without any significant cuts. Yeah, they don't have a lot of flexibility, but they didn't have to release a boatload of good players to get under the cap.

They don't have a QB. It's a bit easier when you don't have a QB to pay.

 

[venecol]

"Kraft is cheap" is a silly statement, but yes, the Pats are playing it more conservatively than other organizations. So yes, there is a grain of truth to it.

When a team converts salary to bonus to defer the cap, they have to pony up CASH immediately to pay out that bonus. So all the moves the Saints made this year means that the owner is opening up the wallet big time - right now, as opposed to spreading it down the road.

The VOID years are a terrible tool that will create all kinds of problems, imo, and should not be allowed. The NFL has allowed arms' races where teams can blow through the CAP massively and hang on the edge of a cliff for several years...and in a QB-dominated league (because of rule changes), the teams who feel set there will have to do it to get the big pieces.

As for the pushing of CAP, the example the Pats fans should look at to keep sane is...Stephon Gilmore. Signing a player for a top end deal and pushing the cap means that the end of that deal, which won't be top-end anymore, and you hear things like "Why would Gilmore play for $7 million when so-and-so is making 16?"

Of course, he's not playing for $7 million - it's just that he got gobs of the current year's $$$ early.

So the NFL, by the way they're allowing CAP manipulation, is creating bad situations for lots of teams. This year, NO, Tampa (again), LA (again), Buffalo, the Raiders, the Chargers, and possibly the Bengals* are all in gamble mode. Seemingly, it unbalances the league as much as it used to be when they tried to find some parity...but it also means that these teams are going to eat it big time when the piper calls.

It also creates massive pay disparities around the league, which also will be detrimental. Football isn't basketball, and adding big name pieces doesn't mean as much in the NFL, but it still distorts the game detrimentally.

(Not including the Broncos because they added the centerpiece for years to come, which is a bit different)

The rules are the same for every team. If some teams choose not to take advantage of the cap rule flexibilities it's on them. I like it this way. This has been a crazy offseason. We've got a bunch of teams going all in that hopefully makes it for a more exciting football season. Then later, it'll be fun to watch some of them crash and burn. I think there was more parity this past season than I can remember. It should continue.

 

[venecol]

What if the best time to strike is not when everyone else is going all-in for this season?

Just thinking out loud. Seemingly a ton of teams are kicking cap cans down the road. Maybe the best time to make a big splash and serious run for it is in Mac's third and fourth seasons when he's more developed, still super cheap, and a lot of today's "super teams" are paying the price of going for broke (and there's quite a few of those).

Now I know it's not the kind of stuff anyone wants to hear but... Again, just thinking out loud.

That could be a problem.

 

[venecol]

The Patriots pretty much spend to the cap limit every year. Kraft's role as a spender or cheap sob is limited to cash flow, meaning that the total cost of these contracts is the same whether there's a bonus or not, it's just a matter of having to come up with some of the cash sooner than planned. Last year he said on the record that he had to come up with $60m cash (or whatever the FA bonuses came to), as if that were a big deal or hardship which kind of surprised me. Maybe he was just trying to sound important, that it takes a lot of business acumen or something. But if his team is worth billions, why doesn't he just have a line of credit with a bank for when he needs to come up with bonuses?

He's didn't become a billionaire by ignoring the time value of money. He can make more $$ by deferring the $60M & investing it. Financing it costs him even more. I bet he hates having to pay this upfront money.

 

[venecol]

Its almost as if the team didn't spend a quarter of a billion dollars last offseason, with the way people are clamoring for action

That's what Kraft said.

 

[venecol]

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There you go... no need to be miserable here... go to bucks land, someplace where you can go to be happy and speak to like minded people

Damn bro, I thought that was a link to a porn site.