The cap is fake!!! Must watch!
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There’s only one Grandmaster
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Fans are misguided when they compare the NFL salary cap to household finances. They don’t work under the same principles.
What’s interesting is that being financially irresponsible for many years will eventually catch up with a team. But it tends to only be a 1 year blip. But being financially responsible on the other hand seems to only build up to a 1 to 2 year spending spree.
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Wouldn’t quite say a one year blip. The saints have been fighting the cap for a couple years And still aren’t out of the hole.
I think once you feel you have most of the pieces in place, and especially the QB, you can go all in with the cap. Until then you are just wasting your cap space. If Goff can show the same level of play that he did in his early Rams days then in 2023 I would be okay with going big. This roster has a ton of pieces now and is getting close. If Goff is the answer at QB it allows us to use cap space and draft picks filling the rest of the holes.
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The Rams disagree with you.
I went looking for a little more clarity and this article broke it down nicely. I like it better when I can actually see the numbers…
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Rams didn’t go all in until they got Stafford. That’s my point.
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I said this exact thing in that Goff thread… 
The Rams went to the Super Bowl with Pro Bowler Goff, and didn’t have to, “go all in”.
Tit for tat.
That was also when they had Aaron Donald going into year 3. There was much more pressure to win with him getting closer to year 10. That’s my opinion anyway.
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It’s funny, Brandt at 4:20 says, “to get to your question, the cap isn’t fake, but there is a loophole” . . . then McAfee totally ignores what Brandt said to him and says, the cap is fake, totally ignoring what Brandt said to him.
What I always say, the cap is kind of irrelevant, pay attention to the cash that is paid.
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no use for it.
I feel like I’m still not fully understanding, but getting close.
In my opinion the Rams have been going all in since 2018.
2018 off-season:
Traded for Marcus Peters
Traded for Aqib Talib
Signed Suh 1 year $14m
Franchised LaMarcus Joyner
Traded for Brandin Cooks
Gave Cooks an $80m extension
Gave Gurley a $60m extension
Gave Donald a $135m extension
Gave Harvenstein a $32m extension
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The cap is not real…….lol…
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Goddamn this is a banger
The cap is far more fluid then a lot of fans think. Watch what teams like the Rams and Saints have done over recent years. If you pay attention year in and year out some of these teams are moving serious money out every year and have been doing that a long time.
Yet I hear fans claim every year that the Lions are broke and don’t have money.
A team can always free up money if they want to. That’s basically what is being said in this video.
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So Rams and Tampa can cheat. And we were afraid of spending too much…blah
- Cash paid is the only thing that matters. If you pay a player money, it counts against the cap (this is how it works in all sports).
- In the NFL, however, the salary cap allows you to treat those cash payments differently if you call that payment a signing bonus.
- Signing bonuses are spread ratably over the length of the contract, up to 5 years
- Even if you call payments signing bonus, it has to hit the cap at some point
So, lets look at Matthew Stafford’s contract. In it’s simplest form, he is getting cash payments of:
2022 - $61.5M
2023 - $27.5M
2024 - $31M
2025 - $32M
2026 - $31M
In MLB, NBA, his cap charges would be the same as his cash payments. In the NFL, they allow you to treat some of the cash payment as Signing Bonus and prorate that signing bonus over the length of the contract (up to 5 years).
That’s what it should be based on how the cash payments are structured. But the Rams take it a step (as all teams do) further and instead of using cash payments to account for the salary cap, they call the cash payments as $60M Signing bonus and a $1.5M salary, this allows them to allocate $12M ($60M over 5 years) to each year of the contract. Plus they further game the system, instead of a $27.5M salary in year 2, they say ok . . . we are going to have a $26M Signing bonus in year 2 and only $1.5M salary.
Even though cash payments remain the same (it’s all the player cares about), the team games the system to push cap charges to future years.
| With a $60M | |||
|---|---|---|---|
| SB in Year 1 | |||
| and a $26M | Cash | ||
| Cash Paid | SB in Year 2 | over Cap | |
| 2022 | 61,500,000 | 13,500,000 | 48,000,000 |
| 2023 | 27,500,000 | 20,000,000 | 7,500,000 |
| 2024 | 31,000,000 | 49,500,000 | (18,500,000) |
| 2025 | 32,000,000 | 50,500,000 | (18,500,000) |
| 2026 | 31,000,000 | 49,500,000 | (18,500,000) |
| 183,000,000 | 183,000,000 | - |
If you look at Stafford’s contract, (look at history), it shows his cash payments compared to salary cap (cash over cap), same as above. You can see, we did the same thing as the Rams are doing right now when we paid Stafford a $50M signing bonus in 2017.
All teams use signing bonuses to a certain extent. They have to do it with rookie contracts. If you look at the three bigger contracts that we signed (Walker, Harris, Chark), we gamed the system to a certain extent with all the contracts.
Even though Tracy Walker’s (look at History) contract has about equal cash payments throughout the contract, we use signing bonus to “game” the system. We save $4.6M in 2022 and allocate it to 2023 and 2024.
| With a | |||
|---|---|---|---|
| 6,965,000 | Cash | ||
| Cash Paid | SB in Year 1 | over Cap | |
| 2022 | 8,000,000 | 3,356,666 | 4,643,334 |
| 2023 | 9,000,000 | 11,321,666 | (2,321,666) |
| 2024 | 8,000,000 | 10,321,668 | (2,321,668) |
| 25,000,000 | 25,000,000 | - |
Same with Charles Harris, he signed a 2yr 13M contract and is getting $7M in yr 1 and $6M in yr 2, but we game the system to get extra cap space in year one and defer those charges to later years, we also included a fake year/void year/dummy year whatever you want to call it. We allocate signing bonus money to this imaginary 3rd year, even though Harris’ contract is only a 2 year deal. We save $4M in 2022 and allocate $2M to 2023 and 2024.
| With a | |||
|---|---|---|---|
| 5,965,000 | Cash | ||
| Cash Paid | SB in Year 1 | over Cap | |
| 2022 | 7,000,000 | 3,023,333 | 3,976,667 |
| 2023 | 6,000,000 | 7,988,333 | (1,988,333) |
| 2024 | - | 1,988,334 | (1,988,334) |
| 13,000,000 | 13,000,000 | - |
We also game the system much in the same way that the Packers/Falcons/Saints/Eagles are gaming the system, by using dummy years. We did this with DJ Chark’s contract. Even though he signed for just the 2022 season for $10M, we spread the cap hit over three years, by using two void years charging $4M in 2022 and $6M in 2023.
| With a | ||||
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 5,965,000 | Cash | |||
| Cash Paid | SB in Year 1 | Adjustment | over Cap | |
| 2022 | 10,000,000 | 4,023,333 | 5,976,667 | |
| 2023 | - | 2,988,333 | 2,988,334 | (5,976,667) |
| 2024 | - | 2,988,334 | (2,988,334) | - |
| 10,000,000 | 10,000,000 | - | - |
Back when Mayhew was GM, we did what the Packers/Saints/Eagles are currently doing and we got in trouble when we did it so much, we couldn’t keep Suh. Mayhew started too early, Holmes isn’t making the mistake that Mayhew made.
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