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salary cap

Patriots Sunday supplement 8/16

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The practice field at Gillette Stadium earlier this morning. Photo – @MikeDussault19

Today marked the end of the Patriots ‘OTA’-like return to camp practices, sessions which allowed veterans and rookies to settle into a new regime as mandated by the league. The first taste of football we’ve had since the end of last season has been great, but really, we’re all excited about the session tomorrow.

Why? Because tomorrow, the Patriots will have their first fully padded practice of camp, and it will be the first time any media (other than the Patriots Unfiltered crew) will be allowed to attend. Make sure you keep an eye out for the return of ‘Tweets of Note’ on the blog tomorrow.

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So Many Free Agents for Patriots in 2017

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The 2016 Patriots will largely resemble the 2015 Patriots, outside of Chandler Jones. Yes, some new faces are certain to emerge while familiar ones might go down, but for the most part the Pats have an incredible amount of continuity from last season. That always bodes well, and given the injuries we saw last season, the Patriots should be a far better team in 2016. And they’ll need to be, given their much tougher schedule.

But looking past this season, there is loads of uncertainty, with 32 players set to hit some form of free agency once the 2017 season starts.

Let’s take an in-depth look at all the decisions the Pats will have to make, because they should start acting sooner than later to prevent a mass exodus.

Patriots 2017 Salary Cap: Offense

Patriots 2017 Salary Cap

Yellow – URFA, Orange – ERFA/RFA, Blue – Rookies, Red – Injury Issue Pending

I don’t want to go back and re-hash my feelings about drafting for the future at RB and RT, but those two positions are lit up far more than I’d like. But let’s be honest, every single guy at those spots could walk and it wouldn’t be the end of the world. Vollmer’s near the end, Cannon is what he is, and none of the running backs, at least at this point, have emerged as long-term building blocks.

Really, Matthew Slater and James Develin are probably the only two real priorities. Yes, they’ll have to add personnel at RB and RT and I wish those replacements could be groomed this season (and who knows maybe they will be, like Gaffney or Waddle), but those are essentially plug and play positions.

Jonathan Cooper is in a fascinating position. He might be the most talented offensive linemen on the roster, but the competition will be stiff at guard. I could see him not making the 2016 team or being their best guard and warranting a significant extension. Impossible to predict at this point.

Sadly, Martellus Bennett will likely be a one-year rental, but we’re used to those so let’s just enjoy him while we’ve got him.

Patriots 2017 Salary Cap: Defense

Yellow - URFA, Orange - ERFA/RFA, Blue - Rookies, Red - Injury Issue Pending

Yellow – URFA, Orange – ERFA/RFA, Blue – Rookies, Red – Injury Issue Pending

Things are a little more complicated on the defensive side of the ball. Most of us feel Hightower and Collins are must re-sign players and that of this huge list of pending free agents for next season they’ll be the priorities. Let’s just assume this is true, because if even one of them leave we better be praying Shea McClellin is legit.

The bigger problem is at defensive end where the top three guys will be unrestricted free agents. Ninkovich is a big question mark given he’s 32. He’d be amenable to a team-friendly deal, but how much does he realistically have left in the tank. Sheard is in his prime, but if he hits the market there should be plenty of teams will to overpay him, especially if he lights it up as a full-time starter this season.

Long’s the wild card. I’m expecting him to really bounce back this season, but he’s just a year younger than Ninkovich. Usually guys like him who come in for one year in a pass rusher role rack up some numbers then walk. I am very curious how it plays out with Long, especially since he spent so many years on a losing team.

What the Patriots truly need is for Tre Flowers (my favorite), Geneo Grissom and/or Rufus Johnson to emerge into potential starters for 2017. At least one of them. Preferably more. But at least one. Defensive end is a critical position and there are huge question marks there beyond this season.

Finally at cornerback, the Pats are in a good spot with Malcolm Butler as a RFA, but giving him a big extension could come at the expense of Logan Ryan. But I don’t think many will be too concerned about his departure. With a number of promising young corners in the mix, Ryan might not even make it through 2016 at the top of the depth chart.

Yes, there are a ton of free agents but the Pats have just $54 million of their 2017 cap space allotted. So they’ll have plenty of room to keep who they want to keep. Of course it takes two to make a deal, but the Pats’ hands won’t be tied to at least pursue who they want with what they deem reasonable deals.

How in today’s salary cap era do you think teams can pay their players but still stay under the cap, how often do you think teams have to make that decision that we want him back but we can’t pay him that much money. Also how would you handle paying your teams best players while still staying under the salary cap

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It’s difficult by design and given the Patriots’ unprecedented and unmatched level of success in the salary cap, they’re a pretty good model to look at.

The headline would probably be letting a player go a year too early rather than a year too late. That’s always the sweet spot of overpaying someone who is on the verge of decline. 

There are plenty of examples, like McGinest, Vrabel, Seymour, Welker – and in most cases those players haven’t had sustained success after leaving New England (we’ll see how Welker does this year, but his concussion history seemed to be catching up to him in 2013).

The other way the Pats have beat the system is allowing open competition for lower round and no-round draft picks. They always seem to have undrafted rookies make the team and often make big impacts. This is even more shocking given their continued ability to win with these players no one wanted.

They also maximize the value of draft picks as a way to mitigate risk. No teams really know what they’re doing in the draft. The only reasonable strategy is to get as many picks as you can. You’re going to miss on a lot of them, but the more picks you make, the more chances you have of finding a Julian Edelman or Alfonzo Dennard in the 7th round.

This was even more true before the rookie salary cap when a miss on a high first-rounder could be crippling.

The last element is getting guys to take market value deals and often re-structuring their contracts when needed. This is easier to sell when you can offer a chance to win a Super Bowl like the Pats can.

Updating Patriots’ Salary-Cap Situation After 1st Wave of Free Agency

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Updating Patriots’ Salary-Cap Situation After 1st Wave of Free Agency

Kicking off Thursday with an updated look at the Pats current salary cap situation with a huge hat tip to Miguel Benzan of PatsFans.com. There are a lot of sites that claim to be up-to-date on the Pats’ numbers but Miguel has been doing this far longer than anyone and is the only one I truly trust.

Taking stock of Patriots’ salary cap – New England Patriots Blog – ESPN Boston

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Taking stock of Patriots’ salary cap – New England Patriots Blog – ESPN Boston

Good update, I think something internal has to happen with one of the situations laid out by Reiss here. Wilfork is likely seeing what other teams might be willing to pay him and should make a decision soon I’d guess.

I do wonder how that whole mechanism is working. Do the Pats have to give him permission to talk to other teams? Or is Vince just stewing and the Pats are just sitting and letting him stew. I’d guess they’re letting him see what’s out there.

Adrian Wilson is an interesting guy to watch, and not just because he’s sitting on No. 24 as the Patriots still haven’t given Revis a number in their presale of his jersey.

Expect something to happen on this front in the next two days…

2014 Patriots Salary Cap Picture – 1/22/2014 Update :Patriots Salary Cap

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2014 Patriots Salary Cap Picture – 1/22/2014 Update :Patriots Salary Cap

I try to talk about salary cap, but I’m nowhere near to the expert that Miguel at PatsFans.com is. He’s been keeping track of the Pats’ cap for long before anyone else was ever into this kind of thing and now he’s writing for PatsFans we can expect more great analysis like the update linked above. Here’s the gist of it…

As you can see from above, the Pats could create more than $21 million in additional cap room if they chose to do so. The Pats could create more than $7.5 million in additional cap room WITHOUT releasing a single player. That is, the $21 million and the $7.5 million figures are in addition to the $6.16 million in cap space that I believe that the Pats will have before redoing the deals of the players already signed for the 2014 season, releasing any signed players, or signing any UFAs.