The Final Eight Plan - Implications of the Uncapped Year

[Mike the Brit]

It's possible that there could be an increase in released players, rather than a decrease, under an uncapped system, for two reasons:

One is that it doesn't matter if the cap cost of releasing the player is higher than cost of retaining him. Since there is no cap, that is immaterial. All you would consider is the salary or other new money.

Two is since there is no floor, there is no reason to pay any player more than the team believes he is worth. If you want to field an $80mm team and save some money, so be it.

For example, the Patriots would incur a $2.9mm cap hit if they released Jarvis Green, according to Miguel's figures. That's very expensive under a capped system. With an uncapped system, if the Patriots felt he was not worth his new money cost, or if they felt they could find a better, cheaper back-up DE, they could release him without worrying about the cap impact.

An excellent point -- worth remembering.