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2023 Salary Cap - What We Know

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So...the Twitter-verse is a raging moshpit of people already screaming to cut this guy and restructure that guy to save space under the cap this year. Honestly, it's insane but then it is Twitter (keep reminding myself of that).

The biggest issue I see is people throwing names and numbers around that are either misleading or, more often, flat wrong. So, I thought I'd throw a few numbers around here that are right. At least as of today.

Currently Projected 2023 Salary Cap - $220 million

First, I said projected because this number isn't set yet. Second, $220 million seems to be what most cap watchers consider to be the floor but the number could be higher, perhaps as much as $230 million. For those who are curious, even at $220 million its an increase of almost $40 million over 2022 and an NFL record. The important thing here is that nothing is final so everyone is projecting and no one knows for sure.

Current Active Contracts - $209,160,173
Current Top 51 Contracts - $205,170,173
Dead Money for 2023 - $13,817,154

The team has 56 players under contract for 2023 today and that is the difference between Active and Top 51. The Top 51 is important because that is the number of contracts that count against the cap from the start of the league year until the first week of the regular season. This is different from the regular season when all players - active roster, practice squad, PUP, and IR - count against the cap. Pretty sure we all understand what Dead Money is.

2022 Rollover Cap - $5,537,577

Each team also gets to rollover their unused cap space from the previous year. This money is then added to the official salary cap for the new year to give the team its Adjusted Salary Cap figure but since we don't know what the official 2023 salary cap figure is yet, we can't figure out what the Adjusted Salary Cap number is either.

Current Top 10 Player Contracts w/ Cap Hit if Cut

PlayerPositionCap NumberHit if Cut before June 1
Carson WentzQB$26.1 M0
Jon AllenDT$21.5 M$18 M
Curtis SamuelWR$13 M$7.2 M
Chase RoullierC$12.9 M$8.1 M
Charles LenoLT$12.5 M$4.5 M
Kendall FullerCB$11.6 M$3.1 M
Montez SweatDE$11.5 M$11.5 M
Terry McLaurinWR$11 M$27.8 M
Chase YoungDE$11 M$11 M
Logan ThomsTE$8.8 M$3.5 M

All the numerical data in this post came from Spotrac.
 
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Thanks for taking the time to put that together. 👊🏼
 
So, if I’m reading this right, keeping Roullier would be a net cost of 4.8m?
 
You just melted my brain with all that hot sexy data!
:gorgeous: :evil:
 
That is no shit, sir.

I didn't even get into the complicated stuff.

Which I am happy to do if there is any interest...? Just sayin.
 
Things that I found interesting:

1. We have two offensive linemen in our top 10 and together they count only $4M more than our top defensive lineman. For comparison, Philly has 4 offensive linemen in their top 10 (2 in their top 4) and the top OL guy makes twice what the top DL guy makes).
2. Even with 2 guys on rookie deals, we have 3 d-line in our top 10.
3. Roullier is probably our best offensive lineman and he is getting paid like it. The problem is that he has played 10 games in the last 2 years.
4. If all the numbers in this table stand for the season, we will pay some $44M to just 3 defensive linemen and that is without resigning Payne. That is roughly 20% of the project salary cap.
5. If we cut Wentz (and I think we all assume that is coming), QBs under contract will count less than $2m.
 
Today teams were notified that the NFL Salary Cap for 2023 has been set at $224.8 million.

After accounting for 2022 rollover, dead money, and the probably cutting of Carson Wentz, Washington currently has roughly $27.7 million in cap space.
 
So if my math is correct, if for some reason they kept Went, they would be basically starting with zero salary cap space.
 
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Today teams were notified that the NFL Salary Cap for 2023 has been set at $224.8 million.

After accounting for 2022 rollover, dead money, and the probably cutting of Carson Wentz, Washington currently has roughly $27.7 million in cap space.

With releasing Wentz that’s it? Oof. 😱
 
The way contracts work in the NFL, during the offseason, only the top 51 contracts actually count against the cap.


1675125168815.png


Add to that rolling over an estimated $5.5M, we enter the offseason with ~$6.8M in space prior to any moves




1675124064220.png


Then quicky looking at our top 14 contracts:

1675124164808.png


Moves can be made

Wentz - $26.2M
Samuel - $5.8M
Leno - $8M
Roullier - $4.3M
Thomas - $5.1M
McCain - $2.6M
Norwell - $3.2M
Lucas - $2.8M

That totals $58M of 'savings' contracts you can work on


That's not to say we're going to cut all of these guys, just that depending on free agency and the draft, moves at some of these positions can be made to move money around if necessary, some being cuts, some restructuring contracts, whatever you wanna do.
 
Yeah, my number doesn't reflect that "Top 51" BS. That is only a help until the opening day when the team has to be under the cap in total - active, PUP, practice squad, and IR.

I know the team will work the Top 51 angle because they have to in the off-season, but I'm looking at the total for now because any big money moves we make in FA are absolutely going to impact that.
 
Of course, Spotrac might be wrong too. I have now seen a couple of other sites referenced on Twitter with different numbers for Washington so who knows?
 
Looking at the salary cap, it makes me think that A) Wentz has to be cut (we knew that, but there really was never a choice which makes trading for him an even worse decision and B) We probably shouldn't sign Payne either unless it's a sign and trade. We have too many holes for a splash signing.
 
And a lot can happen between now and season’s start with the potential for restructuring some contracts.
 
Yeah, no way I’m paying Payne $18 million a year based on one season of top tier production in a contract year.
 
Yeah, no way I’m paying Payne $18 million a year based on one season of top tier production in a contract year.
Yeah, it never really works to play "good" players "great" money. I mean look at the Wizards and Beal or Wall or Gilbert?
 
Agreed Boone.

I think we can reasonably expect more cuts than just Wentz. I keep seeing Logan Thomas mentioned, which would be big cap savings.

I won't be surprised at all if we don't see Sweat and Samuels extended this summer, lowing their respective cap numbers.

As I understand it, we could also convert some of Allen's money to lower his number as well.
 
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