It's unavoidable. Maybe it won't be 2006, but Washington's cap is going to crash at some point. It simply has to.
People have been saying that every year since Snyder bought the team. It hasn't happened and won't.
No, it *HAS TO* happen. If the salary cap is 80 million dollars, and the Redskins spent 90 million worth of REAL money this season (something they've been ROUTINELY doing), then that means there is 10 million that HAS TO RESURFACE somewhere down the line as "dead money". It's absolutely unavoidable. You can borrow from the cap, but you have to pay it back eventually. That's why the Niners have been so bad. They kept borrowing from the cap, until this season they had 20-30 million in "dead money". Eventually, Washington's dead money will come due. They can use creative accounting to delay the hit, but the hit will come.
John Clayton in 2000
Redskins owner Daniel Snyder has the league abuzz by his $100-plus million spending spree this season. Capwise, they are in great shape for now. They have a $1 million cushion in this year's cap and are roughly only $700,000 over next season.
While most consider the cap window for a top team to be five years, the Redskins' window may only be three or four years because Snyder eventually faces tough cap consequences. Quarterback Brad Johnson, wide receiver Albert Connell and linebacker Greg Jones are free agents next year. Guard Tre Johnson, defensive end Kenard Lang and wide receiver Michael Westbrook are up after next year. Where the Redskins will run into cap trouble if Deion Sanders, Bruce Smith and Mark Carrier can't go longer than two seasons. The cap hits coupled with the high-priced re-signings could cause major cap problems for Snyder in 2002.
Warpathinsiders.com outlines the Redskins 2006 situation
So while on the surface the Redskins appear to be in cap hell, some closer analysis of the situation reveals that Washington is in fairly good shape cap wise for 2006.
Dannyboy is a moron when it comes to football, but not when it comes to business.
Okay, then 2007. Brunell, Portis, and Arrington all got MEGABUCK deals. Washington and Springs were both over market price, too. I saw a list that showed Washington was tops in the league in spending over the cap this season, and there's no way to cheat the cap. If you spend OVER the cap one season, then you will have to spend an equal amount UNDER the cap in a coming season. It's unavoidable. Maybe it won't be 2006, but Washington's cap is going to crash at some point. It simply has to.
Actually, the fact that Brunell is actually playing servicable ball right now makes his eventual cap retirement/cut number much more managable. A team gets in cap trouble when they sign players to big deals AND then the player doesn't play out a majority of that deal (is cut/released or traded). This causes an acceleration of their prorated cap number (bonus divided by number of years in a deal) to hit all at once or, depending on when that player was released, part in one year, the rest the next. So let's take Springs as an example. He got a 10 million bonus for a 5 year deal (I'm not sure how long his deal was actually for, I am using 5 years here for ease of explanation). That would make his prorated bonus number 2 million. He's played for the Skins 2 years now, so that eliminates 4 million from his cap number (2 years X 2 million) if he's ever cut/released or traded. If Springs plays out, say 2 more years, that would make that number 8 million. If the Skins decide to part ways with Springs after this, it would cost them 2 million against the cap. If the Skins decided to part ways with Springs after this year (let's say if he was a bust or something like that), then it would have cost them 6 million against the cap. Of course, this discussion isn't factoring in annual salaries, which also will change the yearly cap number for a player. Salaries aren't guaranteed and not eligible to be prorated out over the number of years in deal. That's why teams convert salaries to bonus in order to lower a player's immediate cap numbers. Eventually, yes, the team will have to pay the piper on a player if they keep restructuring his deal. But by then, the cap limit goes up, more cap room is created by other restructures, releases, etc and the cycle repeats itself.
The Skins aren't ever going to be comfortably under the cap. They don't show the best way to manage cap either. But they do know what they're doing apparently and despite rumors of cap hell since 2000, they've been able to pay high draft picks and still be active in the free agent market. They had enough room this year to take all of Coles' cap hit (9 million +) and still pick up new players. Another factor for the Skins cap situation is that the team itself is a lot more stable, so spending on revamping the roster won't happen as much.
I understand that if there's no accelerated cap hit, there's going to be less sudden cap pain, but let's stick with Brunell as an example.Let's pretend that Brunell signs a 5 year, 48 million dollar contract. Let's say that 20 million is in the form of signing bonus, and 28 million is salary. Now, let's say that the salary is divided up to half a million in year 1, half a million in year 2, and 9 million each in years 3-5.
Dan Snyder pays 20.5 million in REAL MONEY in the first season, but only 4.5 million counts against the cap. That means that there is 16 million dollars worth of REAL MONEY that is floating out there and will come due eventually in the form of dead money. If Brunell gets cut after the first season, that 16 million all comes due immediately... but what happens if Brunell DOESN'T get cut? Let's examine.
In year 2, Brunell gets paid .5 million, and counts 4.5 million. That's 4 million worth of dead money. In year 3, Brunell gets paid 9 million, and counts 13 million. That's 4 million worth of dead money. Same scenario in years 4 and 5. As you can see, Brunell's contract STILL leaves dead money on the cap. Snyder spent 16 million more real dollars than cap dollars in year 1, and had to spend 16 million LESS real dollars than cap dollars in years 2-5. This isn't a problem with a normal contract, but with a heavily back-end loaded contract (such as... well, everyone's), a team is likely going to decide that at some point Brunell isn't worth his fast-escalating salary. So they force him to restructure, or they cut him. Either way, the dead money is accelerated, and cap hell comes on. For all the talk of Washington avoiding Cap Hell, that hasn't entirely been the case- just look at the players they've been forced to watch walk away in recent years.
Anyway, the whole point is, Washington spent OVER THE CAP this year, so they will be forced to spend under the cap in future years. There are possible ways to get through it without a cap crash (Denver just went through the quietest cap purge in the history of the NFL. They spent less real money than cap money, going 13-3 *AND* clearing the last of the dead money off of their books). Still, as far above the cap as Washington has been recently, I'm skeptical as to whether they'll be able to navigate cap hell as well as the Broncos. I think they remind me a lot of the Titans, who were on the brink of cap hell for 4 or 5 years, but managed to keep holding the team together by the very skin of their teeth, only to finally be put in a situation where they couldn't delay it any longer. You saw the results this season.