Do they, though? Overthecap estimates our 2022 cap space at $20.5m when taking into account the top 51 rule. That’s 18th out of 32 so middle of the pack. But the rankings don’t take into account the specific circumstances for each team:
- The Patriots have a lot of upcoming free agents: Gilmore, McCourty, Hightower, JC Jackson, Philips, Trent Brown, White, Karras, and Slater as upcoming free agents. The first 6 of those guys are part of the team’s core.
- McCourty’s situation itself is unique. His deal voids automatically like Brady’s did. If he’s not extended prior to free agency, $4.3m of cap charges are accelerated to 2022 - effectively leaving the team with 16.2m in cap space which would knock the Patriots to 22nd out of 32 teams.
Point is, I’m concerned most of the cap space will be spent resigning these guys or signing what they hope are competent replacements. And therefore very little of the cap space will be left for actual upgrades. Extending Wynn would be the easiest way open up a whole lot more space.
They‘ll need to start hitting in the draft more to get real improvements. Mac and Barmore look good so far and hopefully Rham will get out of the doghouse; that’s a good start. We need that to continue.