Stop worrying about salary cap space

[remydat]

Yeah, the $9.5 mil would be the 'cap hit' for this year. However, if we're going to clear up cap room, the best way would be to trade Pep! I'd like to think we could get a pretty good 3rd for Pep, the 3rd we don't have. Clearing up $16 mil might look good to a new coaching regime that's now 'offensive minded'. Heck, $16 mil could get us a FA LT AND DE. I wouldn't discount this at all, but I'm not suggestting it either as I Love me some Pep!

Trading him is the same as cutting him. The SB was paid by us so if we trade him, we are the ones who have to accelerate the SB on our cap not the new team. Otherwise, you would have 9.5 million that was never allocated to any team and you can't have that.

 

[remydat]

Yeah 2013.

 

[Runruffshod75]

Bingo.

Melton is the key it could be the difference between 4 million dollars in the free agent pool.

I still think with Melton franchised we can afford 1 tier 2 OL [Cherilus, Bushrod, Vasquez] and many a tier 3 OL/TE [Slauson, Myers]

Remys makes some damn good points though. Lose Davis, Spaeth. I like Bennett but since he got his new contract in 2011 it's been a horrible deal, im not sure if the way things were last season should all be pinned on Bennett, but if he's cut for a cheaper alternative it doesnt seem ureasonble. Tices gameplan sucked and Jay was busy audibling plays into the Jay and Marshall show. I hope Gould sticks around. Any way you cut it franchising Melton only puts off the inevitable. That extra 3-4 million puts us in a Levitre, Vasquez sweepstake, keep Melton and replace guys like Davis and Speath. Get Melton signed long term now and create some cap space. Any way you cut it, if other contracts are backloaded and others are cut, it's still a good 3-4 million on top of those cap moves.

 

[Bear Pride]

Trading him is the same as cutting him. The SB was paid by us so if we trade him, we are the ones who have to accelerate the SB on our cap not the new team. Otherwise, you would have 9.5 million that was never allocated to any team and you can't have that.

Yeah, you're right, not sure what I was thinking. Probably all the 'over doing' about talking about the cap. But dude, reasoning with you is like talking to a brick wall. I'd swear you're DB54, man, really.

 

[remydat]

Yeah, you're right, not sure what I was thinking. Probably all the 'over doing' about talking about the cap. But dude, reasoning with you is like talking to a brick wall. I'd swear you're DB54, man, really.

I am not sure what I am being stubborn about. Again, the original post was not advocating any specific moves but just showing that our cap situation is pretty flexible. In just about every thread I saw people concerned about not being able to sign somebody because of the cap so I just wanted to show the full universe of moves that can be made to create cap space. If people read the original post correctly there would be someoe many people asking me why I would cut Gould when I never said I would. I just showed what cap space can be created if the Bears decided they didn't want a 2.9 million kicker. In short, I was discussing the possibilities and not advocating we have to do these moves. So again, not sure how that makes me a brickwall when I am trying to show people we have options.

 

[Major Ursa]

I realize this was just a hypothetical post, but does anyone actually think it's a good idea to cut Gould? I would say hell no, but I would be interested to find out if I'm in the minority.

 

[remydat]

I realize this was just a hypothetical post, but does anyone actually think it's a good idea to cut Gould? I would say hell no, but I would be interested to find out if I'm in the minority.

Put it like this. If there was a rookie or vet who you think was 80-90% as good as Gould and was worth 500k and there was an OLman that you needed to find 2.5 million for to sign, do you keep Gould at 2.9 million or do you cut him, sign the guy fro 500k and use the 2.4 million saved to help sign the OLman? That is really the question being put forth.

Having said that, of the nine cuts I proposed, Gould would probably be the last one I think about as you could probably get that money by cutting or restructuring other people first where the decision doesn't come down to Gould. However, if for some strange reason it came down to Gould or other K plus an OL then I probably go with the latter option.

 

[hyatt151]

I have seen a lot of people concerned by the fact we only have 10.5 million in salary cap space so I decided to look at the numbers and prove that number is misleading. I am not suggesting all these cuts or resignings have to occur but just showing you how Cliff Stein's cap management over the years has given us a lot of flexibility. Right now we have only 70 million committed to the 2014 Cap and 45 million committed to the 2015 Cap. So we have 51 million in cap space in 2014 and 76 million in cap space in 2015. I don't have numbers for 2016 and 2017 but you can be sure that there is even less money committed to those years as only guys with long term deals like Forte would have any money committed in those years. So with that said, here is how that 10.5 million can easily be increased.

1. If we choose to we can borrow 1.5 million against a future cap year from 2014 and 2017. New Cap Space = 12 million. Reduction in 2015 Cap Space from 76 million to 74.5 million.

2. The following playings can be cut for up cap savings of approximately 16.5 million (Gould, Davis, Bennet, Garza, Hester, Spaeth, Big Toe, Mannelly, Costanzo). New Cap Space = 28.5 million.

3. The following playsers can restructured to create 27.5 million in Cap Space in 2014, 4.5 million in cap space in 2014 and reduce cap space by 16 million in 2015, 42.5 million in 2016, 47 million in 2017 (Peppers, Tillman, Jennings, Marshall, Briggs. So new Cap Space = 56 million this year, 55.6 million in 2014 and 58.5 million in 2015.

So the moral of the story. If there is anyone on the Bears to trust, it is Cliff Stein. He knows what he is doing. I am not suggesting we do all of these deals and I can back up any of the cuts or restructures with numbers to prove how it works but didn't want to include all the detail as the post would be massive. The only guy who is problematic is Peppers because restructuring him would involve him taking a pay cut but only if he legitimately thought he would be getting 14 million and 16.5 million as a 34 or 35 year old. More likely he and his agent being Tar Heel grads like me understood those final two years were just there to make the overall numbers look pretty.

Either, way, stop crying. We are fine from a cap perspective.

:facepalm:

 

[vinson555]

Cut Gould?

Ban him.

Here is a guy who does not read the whole post...

 

[dabearsjjk]

So you want to cut a kicker who is guaranteed to make 90% of his kicks? How dumb is that? Talk about leaving it on the field?

Also want to cut a long snapper who rarely ever makes a mistake?

Maybe we should pick up david akers:crying:

 

[Slacker]

You guys who are minimizing the salary cap issues remind me of my wife. Don't worry that we don't have enough in the checkbook this week, we'll just borrow from next week. Restructuring and pushing dollars out to next year and beyond doesn't solve the problem, it just hides it for a year and reduces the teams flexibility. The fact that some of you can justify cutting an incredibly accurate Gould tells me how bad you've got it.

 

[remydat]

So you want to cut a kicker who is guaranteed to make 90% of his kicks? How dumb is that? Talk about leaving it on the field?

Also want to cut a long snapper who rarely ever makes a mistake?

Maybe we should pick up david akers:crying:

I don't want to do anything. I simply illustrated how much we would save if we did and also explained why it makes sense. Kickers are generally cheap and even the worst long snapper in the league probably makes a major mistake 1 or twice all season.

 

[remydat]

You guys who are minimizing the salary cap issues remind me of my wife. Don't worry that we don't have enough in the checkbook this week, we'll just borrow from next week. Restructuring and pushing dollars out to next year and beyond doesn't solve the problem, it just hides it for a year and reduces the teams flexibility. The fact that some of you can justify cutting an incredibly accurate Gould tells me how bad you've got it.

It's called cap management. If I am 36 million under the cap for 2014 and I have to spend 95% of my cap now then moving cap dollars into 2014 is entirely reasonable. The Bears have more than enough profits to sign players and are simply using the CBA rules to allocate that money across several years in the most efficient manner. That is not the same as your wife spending money you guys don't have.

And if there is a kicker worth 500k that kicks like Blair Walsh then yes Gould at 2.925k is a luxury. That doesn't mean we have to do it. It means if you can get close to equivalent value for much cheaper then you do so. That is basic economics.

 

[WindyCity]

It could also very well be that Emery wants to build through the draft.

He may make 3-4 signings of lower tier guys to patch holes [TE Delanie Walker, OG Brandon Moore, OT Jermon Bushrod] and try and get his star players in the draft.

It might not be that we do not have the money to spend and more that we don't want to spend it, or at least over pay for free agents.

 

[ClydeLee]

It's called cap management. If I am 36 million under the cap for 2014 and I have to spend 95% of my cap now then moving cap dollars into 2014 is entirely reasonable. The Bears have more than enough profits to sign players and are simply using the CBA rules to allocate that money across several years in the most efficient manner. That is not the same as your wife spending money you guys don't have.

And if there is a kicker worth 500k that kicks like Blair Walsh then yes Gould at 2.925k is a luxury. That doesn't mean we have to do it. It means if you can get close to equivalent value for much cheaper then you do so. That is basic economics.

It's base economics... Moronic utopian football policy.

Yes it's possible.. So what? It's beyond a sensible likelihood. You don't make decisions in hopes of breaking records in lucky success with Walsh type picks for your team. Most teams don't spend 2.5 nil on a kicker, most also don't draft one with 1/5 picks nor expect many results equal savings to a team going from a top 5 position player to cheap.

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[Bear Pride]

I am not sure what I am being stubborn about. Again, the original post was not advocating any specific moves but just showing that our cap situation is pretty flexible. In just about every thread I saw people concerned about not being able to sign somebody because of the cap so I just wanted to show the full universe of moves that can be made to create cap space. If people read the original post correctly there would be someoe many people asking me why I would cut Gould when I never said I would. I just showed what cap space can be created if the Bears decided they didn't want a 2.9 million kicker. In short, I was discussing the possibilities and not advocating we have to do these moves. So again, not sure how that makes me a brickwall when I am trying to show people we have options.

Which is why I concluded we'd have approx $20 mil in cap money to spend ..... without signing any of our OWN existing FA's ....... without keeping any of the players signed to future contracts. I'd say the rest is pure fuckin speculation at this point. I think it's pretty clear that the Bears will try to sign as FEW of their existing OWN FA's as possible, while replacing them with young, inexpensive players that MT wants to bring in. There will also probably be 1 -5 current Bears players, that are under contract, that are either traded or cut as well.

I think it'e pretty fuckin cut and dry at this time until we get some news of the Bears evaluating their own guys.

 

[remydat]

It's base economics... Moronic utopian football policy.

Yes it's possible.. So what? It's beyond a sensible likelihood. You don't make decisions in hopes of breaking records in lucky success with Walsh type picks for your team. Most teams don't spend 2.5 nil on a kicker, most also don't draft one with 1/5 picks nor expect many results equal savings to a team going from a top 5 position player to cheap.

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I listed 14 moves that could save us cap room. You are free to advocate the Bears doing any one of those moves in any order or combination you wish. The one I would do last and only if I absolutely had to was release Gould. I said that already so not sure why that garners so much attention as if anyone suggested it had to happen. Do people actually read posts in the context they were written?

 

[ClydeLee]

I listed 14 moves that could save us cap room. You are free to advocate the Bears doing any one of those moves in any order or combination you wish. The one I would do last and only if I absolutely had to was release Gould. I said that already so not sure why that garners so much attention as if anyone suggested it had to happen. Do people actually read posts in the context they were written?

It's an example of an entire concept of over detailed to a point of meaningless... As others mentioned, they could save even more cap space by even more of the unlikely cuts if you're aiming for nothing but wildly potential improvements of "value"

The point itself is weak... They don't have to stop worrying about the cap because they Could make cuts... That's why someone WOULD worry about the cap. Having to cut quality players for cheaper replacements. There is no reason to worry about it much because they don't have to do those cuts unlike many other teams.

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[remydat]

Which is why I concluded we'd have approx $20 mil in cap money to spend ..... without signing any of our OWN existing FA's ....... without keeping any of the players signed to future contracts. I'd say the rest is pure fuckin speculation at this point. I think it's pretty clear that the Bears will try to sign as FEW of their existing OWN FA's as possible, while replacing them with young, inexpensive players that MT wants to bring in. There will also probably be 1 -5 current Bears players, that are under contract, that are either traded or cut as well.

I think it'e pretty fuckin cut and dry at this time until we get some news of the Bears evaluating their own guys.

Well of course it is speculation as none of us are psychic. Although I would say resigning Tillman and Jennings is a necessity and redoing BMarshall's deal would make a lot of sense. Briggs you might not want to do given his age and Peppers you can only do if he is receptive to a bit of a pay cut.

Either way, there is enough money there to do whatever we want within reason and I don't see the cap as a huge impediment as some make it out to be. Time will tell who is right.

 

[Bear Pride]

Well of course it is speculation as none of us are psychic. Although I would say resigning Tillman and Jennings is a necessity and redoing BMarshall's deal would make a lot of sense. Briggs you might not want to do given his age and Peppers you can only do if he is receptive to a bit of a pay cut.

Either way, there is enough money there to do whatever we want within reason and I don't see the cap as a huge impediment as some make it out to be. Time will tell who is right.

I agree with you here, and I still think a large part Lovie was let go was that the Bears had a decent amount of money and SO MANY of their OWN FA's. Perfect time for a new coaching regime to come in and put their stamp on the team. I DO think there will be some 'big name' moves for the Bears. I wouldn't be surprised to hear some guys getting cut.

We've got like 10-11 days until the official start I believe, we should start to hear some stuff then, imo. I do think there will be some contract stuff, like re-doing BM's contract makes sense as that was not a 'Bears' contract, and we do have Stein. I think re-doing Pep's contract is NOT going to happen. As far as Pep, I still think it makes sense to try to trade him for a draft pick rather then just cut him. We'll probably keep him for another year as we transform the D, imo.