Saints face another bumpy offseason
 

The bounty scandal may be a thing of the past, but that doesn’t mean the New Orleans Saints are in for a quiet offseason.

Coach Sean Payton has to get reinstated from his season-long suspension and presumably signed to a new contract extension. His previous deal was voided by the NFL due to some language in the contract and that’s led to speculation that Payton could jump elsewhere.

There still could be some turbulence on that front. But even if things go smoothly with the reinstatement and the contract, the Saints still face a huge offseason issue: the salary cap.

At the moment, the Saints have $137.5 million committed toward the 2013 cap. That’s second only to the New York Jets ($142.5 million). The exact cap won’t be set until the spring, but the NFL has told teams to prepare as if the cap is going to be $120 million. It’s likely to be a little higher than that, but the Saints are going to be way over whatever the cap is.

That means they’re going to have to make some difficult choices because they have a lot of veterans with big cap numbers. Undoubtedly, they’ll restructure some deals and quarterback Drew Brees, who has the biggest cap figure at $17.4 million isn’t going anywhere.

But the Saints, who also will need to make room to re-sign some of their own free agents and pursue players from other teams (and, later on, sign a draft class), almost certainly will have to release some big-name players to get under the cap by March.

I’m looking at the individual cap figures for 2013 and here’s a list of guys that jumped out at me as being candidates for restructure or release:
Defensive tackle Brodrick Bunkley, $4.7 million
Receiver Marques Colston, $6.6 million
Guard Jahri Evans, $9.8 million
Cornerback Jabari Greer, $5.4 million
Guard Ben Grubbs, $7.3 million
Safety Roman Harper, $7.1 million
Linebacker David Hawthorne, $4.8 million
Linebacker Will Herring, $1.9 million
Linebacker Curtis Lofton, $7.1 million
Receiver Lance Moore, $4.7 million
Defensive end Will Smith, $14.5 million
Linebacker Jonathan Vilma, $8.6 million

I copied this because it pertains to other threads about who we should keep or not. What flies off the page is the last 2. That alone would put us 3 mil under the projected 120 mil cap. A couple more restructures here and there, maybe even a few more cuts and we are in business. Will Smith 14.5 mil...as soon as the last game ends he should be told to clean out his locker and give up his playbook! No brainer!

Re: Saints face another bumpy offseason
 

This is what irked me about Drew's contract demands. I understand that these guys and their agents like to play the market for as much as they can get. But there was a lot of criticism thrown at Mickey Loomis for not getting this done sooner, and I personally never understood why considering our cap situation. People were insisting that the Saints should restructure contracts, and explaining guaranteed money to me (as if I didn't know already), and saying how all this would make it work. Well, they did all that, yet look at these numbers coming up. Drew really hurt us here.

Yes I know, he's gotta get whatever he can, blah blah. I'm a fan, my job isn't to worry about whether a mega millionaire will be able to pay his bills. This contract is going to really test our front office and scouting department, more than ever before, to fill the voids with some of those diamonds in the rough. That, or hope we get some home town discounts.

Re: Saints face another bumpy offseason
 

Mickey Loomis will fix this... I have no worries about contract issues.

Re: Saints face another bumpy offseason
 

This is Loomis specialty and he has yet to fail us.

There are a lot of under-preformers that need to go... A few under-preformers that need to be restructured.

when you struggle to make .500 this is very easy to do.

Had we been 13-3 and made the playoffs then you have less percived bad talent to cut.

Re: Saints face another bumpy offseason
 

Will Smith and Vilma alone would get them under the cap, look Loomis has proven year in and year out that he is a cap genius. Nothing to see here move along

Re: Saints face another bumpy offseason
 

Alot of defense on that list.

Re: Saints face another bumpy offseason
 

In Loomis I Trust !

Re: Saints face another bumpy offseason
 

I think you mean a lot of players on the defensive side of the ball. We didn't have any defense this year!

Re: Saints face another bumpy offseason
 

Thank you sir, I stand corrected.

Re: Saints face another bumpy offseason
 

Robbing Peter to pay Paul............I wonder how the league feels about this? :wink:

Re: Saints face another bumpy offseason
 

Releasing players does not get you off the hook. The cap hit stays the same unless you trade them, and give their salary to another team. So no, this isn't going to be an easy fix.

And by the way, who knew this many people would under perform? If they hadn't underperformed, then what? We would have had to cut them anyway. I have no doubt the Saints will get under the cap, simply because they have no choice. But what is this team going to look like when that is done? Like I said, we're going to have to make some shrewd moves, because I don't see us having much money to spend on any big names. Drew has put the vice on the team's collective balls. I'm counting on Sean Payton, not Mickey Loomis to turn this around. We should have won with these players this year.

Re: Saints face another bumpy offseason
 

Don't forget that guys like Jimmy Graham are gonna want some money. I'm worried about the cap too. I'd like to keep Vilma but not at that price. Will Smith isn't going to play here next year. It's going to be an interesting off season that's for sure.

Re: Saints face another bumpy offseason
 

8 out of 12 players mentioned are on defense, a reasonable place to begin evaluating. Not worried, "In Loomis we trust". At that time, it will be up to those individuals to, "Do your job". I think we'll be alright, though i believe we'll see a lot of new faces on the defensive side of the ball.

Re: Saints face another bumpy offseason
 

Will Smith's contract screams restructure

Re: Saints face another bumpy offseason
 

True, but it isn't like many of them are breaking the bank. There are only a couple players on defense with big salaries, which means if we overhaul the defense, we're still going to have to pay whoever else we bring in to replace them. It's not as easy as just dumping players. There have to be sufficient replacements, and if we want to improve we're going to need money to spend. I don't see where that money is going to come from. IMO, all of the big contract guys will have to restructure and defer some of their salary into some kind of bonus. If they don't, some important players will walk, and we'll just have to find some more under the radar talent.

Re: Saints face another bumpy offseason
 

People were saying in 2010, when the big swing in Saints free agency happened, a lot of players were coming due at the same time, people said that it was going to be almost impossible for the Saints and Loomis to keep the team together, to keep everybody, they predicted that the Super Bowl team would have to be dismantled, the sky was falling, doom and gloom....well we only wound up losing Goodwin and maybe one or two minor guys...not worried. They had that "free agent tracker" graphic thing on nola.com, updated every day, and Loomis lit it up like a pinball machine....

Obviously this is cap instead of free agency but same thing....

The new "normal" is going to be to have guys playing for "league minimum" with all of the $$$ in the signing bonus and incentives and things that don't count against the cap. The Saints and Loomis are already waaaay ahead of the rest of the league in this....did no one here in this thread, see what happened last year? It had to have been a record number of guys who took the restructure, took the money "off the books" instead of in the base pay....the people here crying doom and gloom and trying to blame this on Drew are going to be surprised at how logically and surgically Loomis attacks this...

Some people are panicking, like "OMG there won't be any money, we're going to have to dig to find some bargains and diamonds in the rough!" and it's like, I guess these people don't even realize, WTF has this team been doing the last 7-8 years? Where has everybody been? Loomis and Payon have done virtually NOTHING but find bargains and low-round diamonds in the rough....INCLUDING Drew.

Re: Saints face another bumpy offseason
 

Brees would not sign a contract until the results of the arbitration suit were known.

Re: Saints face another bumpy offseason
 

If cutting the high priced players won't help. How do you get "under the cap?"

Re: Saints face another bumpy offseason
 

The Saints put themselves in the vice by trying to tag Brees for the third time in his career. Thus the arbitration suit.

Re: Saints face another bumpy offseason
 

If we find so many diamonds in the rough and low round treasures then how in the heck did we get so far over the cap?

Re: Saints face another bumpy offseason
 

"Coach Sean Payton has to get reinstated from his season-long suspension and presumably signed to a new contract extension. His previous deal was voided by the NFL due to some language in the contract and that’s led to speculation that Payton could jump elsewhere."

You just have to know that this will happen about a week prior to TC and SP will sign his contract about 2 weeks into TC, but who the hell cares what the fans have to go through right? Who the hell cares what the product you put on the field two years in a row is like right? So, is Vitt gonna run the draft or what? This is all BS.