Kyrie Irving named Eastern Conference Player of the Week
February 2, 2015Kyrie Irving to participate in third straight Three-Point Shootout
February 2, 2015Your Cleveland Browns have been paying plenty of money to keep their own free agents and garner the services of others in recent years, but they’re still healthy in terms of the salary cap. Joe Haden pulls into the lead position in terms of cap hits at $11.7 million in 2015 followed closely by Joe Thomas ($10.2 mil) and Paul Kruger ($8.2 mil.) All things considered though, you don’t mind paying those guys. And even when paying them, the Browns have plenty of space to compete for any top free agent (Suh?) they feel like chasing this off-season.
Most Est. 2015 Cap Space:
1. #Jaguars ($57M)
2. #Raiders ($50M)
3. #Browns ($43M)
4. #Jets ($42M)
5. #Titans ($34M)http://t.co/TIaHcpLP0u— Spotrac (@spotrac) February 2, 2015
How do you arrive at $43.3 million? Easy! Take the cap number of $142 million, add the rollover of $18.9 million, subtract cap commitments of $109.7 million and a draft pool commitment of $7.9 million and you should end up with $43.3 million.
But it doesn’t end there. The Browns have some decisions to make on players who are entering prime years to become cap casualties if the Browns decide to move on. Who are those players? Glad you asked!
- Desmond Bryant – I like Bryant and think he’s a valuable addition to the defense when he’s healthy, but his contract was structured so that this season would be a decision point for the Browns. He costs $7 million on the cap and only $3 million in dead money if cut, meaning the Browns could gain $4 million in cap space by moving on.
- Paul Kruger – I can’t imagine the Browns getting rid of Kruger, but I’d be remiss if I didn’t point out they could save $4.6 million in cap space. Again, after the season he had, I’m pretty sure the Browns want him here to keep doing that.
- Joe Thomas – Yes! I’m kidding. Mostly. The Browns aren’t going to cut Joe Thomas. They could save $9 million in cap space if they did though. Just saying.
The truth is that the Browns faced a situation last season where they could have cut Ahtyba Rubin and didn’t do that. I’m guessing they’ll prefer to keep the team intact wherever possible and concentrate on adding, rather than trying to replace expensive players with cheap ones. The fact is that right now the Browns’ most expensive players are still producing for them.
One thing to always keep in mind as well, is that this team must constantly worry about flexibility as long as they don’t have a franchise quarterback. When and if they find that guy, they never want to be faced with gutting the team around that guy in order to secure his services for as long as possible.
23 Comments
Give it all to Alex Mack. He’s not a quarterback, running back or receiver, he just makes them all better.
Just call him BASF
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZJHPpsb3FzM
Most Est. 2015 Cap Space:1. #Jaguars ($57M)
2. #Raiders ($50M)
3. #Browns ($43M)
4. #Jets ($42M)
5. #Titans ($34M)
Hmmm, what do all 5 teams have in common? Could it be that they are missing an above average player at an important position? Like long-snapper? Or is it a different position?
yeah, that was my (apparently very dated) reference
well, then I dated myself too because I immediately got the reference 🙂
Now go out and use it…use it to address both sides of the line then use the draft on skill positions and for depth!
Hmmm, what do all 5 teams have in common?
Dregs of the league aside great point and since it’s most likely (1)There isn’t a FA QB worthy of being paid and (2)There isn’t a franchise saving QB in the draft they should use some of Slim Jim’s money on the rest of the team. Make or break Farmer lets see what you do.
I read that as “top five owners who spent as little as possible”.
i was actually thinking Vidal Sassoon…
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QonI2MWxoLY
I refuse to even address you as long as you have that avatar.
Jets and Raiders are also the #s 1 and 2 ranked markets in the NFL. How can Goodell even allow that sort of thing?
Oakland is the #2 market? 49ers control the bay all the way down to Silicon Valley and most in Sacramento are 49er allegiance too (the bandwagon effect is strong). I guess you can make a case for SoCal still being split between the Raiders and Chargers but it’s pretty meek overall with other teams having a grasp in the LA market too.
It’s not right to discriminate against champions but once the Bruins win a title I promise I’ll change it!
Hopefully we can use this $$ to lock people into front loaded contracts to use space now, but also leave options available when our young players mature to high dollar contracts
Definitely don’t cut Kruger, Bryant or Thomas. Kruger and Thomas were excellent last year and Des was our most consistent lineman.
Another thing to consider is that with all of this dysfunction surrounding the organization, we’ll probably have to overpay the already overpaid Free Agents. Don’t cut those guys, the grass may seem greener, but it’s probably overpriced crab grass.
http://www.reddit.com/r/nfl/comments/wt1sr/list_of_nfl_teams_by_media_market_size/
RankTeam(s)Pop. in TV Households (000s)Media Market(s)1)New York Giants / Jets22421New York, Hartford-New Haven1 , Wilkes-Barre–Scranton2)Oakland Raiders / San Francisco 49ers10645San Francisco-Oakland-San Jose, Sacramento-Stockton-Modesto, Monterey-Salinas3)Chicago Bears10606Chicago, South Bend-Elkhart, Rockford4)New England Patriots9684Boston (Manchester), Hartford-New Haven1 , Providence-New Bedford, Springfield-Holyoke5)Philadelphia Eagles8688Philadelphia, Harrisburg-Lancaster-Lebanon-York26)Carolina Panthers8152Charlotte, Greenville-Spartanburg-Asheville-Anderson, Greensboro–High Point–Wiston-Salem, Columbia7)Dallas Cowboys8071Dallas-Fort Worth, Waco-Temple-Bryan, Sherman-Ada8)Detroit Lions8032Detroit, Flint-Saginaw-Bay City, Toledo, Lansing, Windsor9)Atlanta Falcons6462Atlanta, Macon10)Houston Texans6452Houston, Beaumont-Port Arthur11)Washington Redskins5853Washington (Hagerstown)12)Miami Dolphins5722Miami-Fort Lauderdale, West Palm Beach-Fort Pierce13)Minnesota Vikings5073Minneapolis-Saint Paul, Rochester-Mason City-Austin, Mankato14)Cleveland Browns4794Cleveland-Akron (Canton), Youngstown
sadly, that does not tend to work in the NFL. with the non-guaranteed nature of most contracts, players only see what is in front of them and not what has been paid out.
the real reason (outside of the lack of QB) that we have so much cap space is that we have had few draft picks worth investing a 2nd (or 3rd) contract on. JoeT, Alex Mack, and Joe Haden are sadly the exceptions.
Okay, but that’s combining both 49ers & Raiders and saying they both get claim to all those households, which is obviously not true (SF controls much of the region, though the Raiders have a strong foothold in many of the Latino communities).
Even giving them a 50% split in those demographics, that puts the Raiders at #13 behind Miami and ahead of Minnesota. Giving them the more likely 35% split puts them around Green Bay.
Conversely, giving the Jets the same 35% split would still put them 9th overall and possibly as high as 5th depending on where the demographics fell.
Does anyone understand the new free agency spending rules?
Per nypost:
Teams such as the Jets, Raiders and Browns, who hoarded enormous amounts of cap room in recent years just to save cash, can’t do that anymore. They now will be required to spend it in free agency under rules of the 2011 labor agreement or cut a check equal to their unused cap space to the NFL players union.
there is a cap floor that all teams will have to hit eventually. they either initially misreported it though or changed it because we got to keep rolling over our KimK data (errr, cap space).
NY post seems to indicate that is finally ending. If so, then expect a couple big front-loaded deals to “name” UFAs to try to convince them to sign here. Or, front-loaded deals to RFA that their existing team will have trouble matching.
Why? Because while a front-loaded deal may not help the long-term cap, it certainly can convince a player to come here. If we are going to have to cut the check to the entire team anyway, then we might as well give it to a player we would otherwise not have on the 53man.
well, i like the sound of that. What are the chances the Browns write a $20million check to the players’ union?
touche.
the NY Post says to the NFLPA, but I remember it being in equal parts to the players on the team. perhaps the machination is to cut it to the NFLPA so they can chop it up equitably?
anyways, I would hope that we could avoid it, but it’s hard to say whether our owner would rather just spend the minimum by staying under and cutting the check or actually aggressively trying to go get Justin Houston.
sadly, the best RFA on the market? our own Gipson. But, I would love to steal Justin Tucker from Baltimore and Devon Still from Cinci.
http://www.spotrac.com/nfl/free-agents/rfa/