I agree with the article entirely. It's why we don't have to worry about cap hell here, despite the promises of doom from opposing fans.
I think Jason does a great job with that site and the information and insight he brings is invaluable. With that said, I think he is whistling past the graveyard a bit on this one. You don't need to look any further than this offseason to see the problems their cap management has created. There were positions all over the roster that needed to be improved, yet they were very limited in what they could do in free agency. To me, that speaks to poor cap management, and the bad news is it doesn't look like things will be much better next year.
Seems like every contract starts with a 'general feel' about a player. If that 'general feel' says the player is almost certain to be solid and on a high level for years to come, Tanny writes the contract one way. Otherwise, as in Turner and Smith, Tanny writes it another way. So our cap situation comes down to Tanny's 'gut feel' on a player before the contract is written. If Tanny guesses 'right', ie Revis, the contract is golden. Guesses wrong, ie Santonio, the contract becomes a nightmare. Go tanny!
Local grocery had 'buy one, get one free' on 5lb bags of crab legs. Can't go wrong!!! Got home, both bags were spoiled. Hate to be Tanny at times.....
I didn't suggest it did. Balancing a budget means making hard choices, which is something every team in the league has to do. The Jets have decided to hand out one big contract after another, guaranteeing money to players who might not be worth it in return for short term cap space, and the result is they have no capital to improve the team, this year and next.
They were able to sign a couple of guys this off season. Next off season we will see a few guys come off the books as the contracts were planned for. The Jets weren't able to sign any big time FA's this year but they have most of their young core guys locked up for at least a few years. The good thing is that most of our cap is tied up into guys either in their prime or heading into their prime. 8 of the top 10 guys fit that category and the 2 that don't (Scott, Pace) - they will both likely come off the books next year saving us over $15 million in cap space alone. If Sanchez were playing at the level of his cap figure I think most people would be more than happy with our roster. It's not like the Jets have had to release any key players in order to stay under the cap lately.
After they resigned Pouha, what exactly did they do? Landry, Bell, Maybin, Thomas, and Schillens? Am I missing anyone? Take a look at those contracts. Total amount of guaranteed money = 4 Million (average of 800K per player) Total amount of non-guaranteed salary = 1.435 Million (average of 127.5K per player) It's also worth noting they were all one-year deals. Do those numbers seem a little low to you? Do you think having such a small amount of money available hurt their ability to improve the team? Isn't that extremely disappointing considering the the talent they have at S, OLB, RT, RB, OL (depth wise) and WR? Let's operate under the assumption that Pace and Scott are released, which clears $15M, and why don't we clear Eric Smith and Wayne Hunter, which gives you another $7M to work with. That would bring their 2013 cap number to around $115M, which is probably less than $10M under the limit. Here is a list of guys scheduled to become UFAs, not including the aforementioned players. Brandon Moore Dustin Keller Mike DeVito Matt Slauson Shonn Greene Forget about depth, look at all the positions they will need to find starters for 2 Safeties 2 OLBs 1 ILB TE RT 2 Guards RB You better hope Stephen Hill works out, because they're gonna be relying on him in a big way. It's pretty clear the Jets are a team that doesn't have a lot of financial flexibility, and that is gonna hurt their chances of fielding a competitive team over the next few years. That's what I consider poor management.
You're ignoring the flexibility they've built in to a lot of deals by using high base salaries. It's why the projected cap figure is high, but it allows the team to restructure as required to create space. No team has 22 great starters and 30 quality backups all on affordable deals with additional cap space to play with. Guys need to be paid. Bad management is carrying significant sums on the cap for players who aren't on the team. We don't have that problem.
lets see now we have the author of this article's well researched work indicating that the Jets have the cap very well managed and then we have noted capologist John Clayton (who, to give credit, does look like he was the president of the math and slide rule clubs while the other kids played football in his grammar and high school days) gloom and doom report that the Jets are billions over the cap for the next century along with Dick Semen-i and various chowd trolls of course who should we believe?
I'm not ignoring anything. They restructured deals for Sanchez and Ferguson this off-season, but they still didn't have much flexibility. I'm confident they'll be able to restructure a few more guys next year (Harris and Cromartie would be my guess) but I doubt it will allow them to go after anyone who is gonna command real money. What you're ignoring is the fact that those restructures, while providing short term relief, give the team LESS flexibility down the road. All those restructures do is push money into future cap years, and create more dead money if you're interested in getting rid of the player. They would have had over $10 million in dead money last year from Gholston, Woody, and Jenkins alone. They caught a HUGE break that the new CBA took all that off the books.
The Patriots have 5 guys with a cap value over $3.5M, all of whom are undeniably among the best at their respective positions. The Jets have 11, most of which you couldn't say that about.
I don't really pay attention to other team cap room, but I remember when the dead money thing was announced everyone said the Jets benefited the most. Either Tanny gambled and it paid off or he had some inside knowledge that dead money was being taken, which is what most fans here thought was happening. I guess he could have had a backup plan but we will never know. The flip side is that the Jets were hindered by the CBA and the final four rules because in theory the final 4 team are supposed to be established teams who don't need much help, instead it was the 9-7 get hot at the right time Jets who it affected.
The issue is not cap management. The issue is why the Jets are paying the same amount of money for less talent than the elite teams. The 2012 Jets have the same problem the 2003 Jets had: their talent management is poor and they routinely overpay for players who then turn out to be just better than average and in some cases not.
Fair points all around. Another consideration would be that I think most of that dead money (around $7M or so) came exclusively from Gholston. Tannenbaum didn't have a choice, he had to cut Gholston, but I think that is a talent evaluation issue, not a cap management issue.
In terms of those positions that needs starters, I guess it comes down to how well their talent evaluation over the last couple of drafts have been, and whether some of those guys show signs of stepping up towards the end of this season. Safeties, I think they'll be hoping that one of their later round safeties shows the goods, and possibly sign Landry to a long term deal if he actually stays healthy and performs. LB is definitely something they will have to address next draft, and hope to hit gold. I have a feeling that if they can't find suitable OLBs, that shift towards 4-3 and the 46 with accelerate next offseason. Whether they need another ILB will probably depend on how Davis does. TE they have some depth in players, and now they just need to evaluate whether they have anyone behind Keller who could step into that role should they decide not to sign him long term. In terms of OL, I'm guessing they'll keep Slauson if he improves this season, and are hoping Ducasse could fill the other guard role. RT will probably have to be addressed in the draft. RB, we have 3 relatively untested guys who could be a solution rather than signing someone expensive in FA. It'll be hard to tell until they're properly battle-tested, though I'm not too high on Powell. Who knows though, since it's early days. In the end, hard to say if the next few years will be hurt by management until this latest crop of players has given us an idea of what holes are still unfilled come the end of the season. I do like that we aren't beholden dead-cap-wise to players later in their contracts, and that a number of key positions are locked in for their prime-years for the future. In terms of not having huge amounts of money to play with in the offseason, I don't think throwing big money around in FA is the way to go anyway. As long as we're keeping the players we want, I'm happy as long as the FA is used on cheaper players to supplement depth rather than to find starters, as grabbing starters through FA usually means overpaying them.
