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Fleur-de-Links, November 29: Alvin Kamara and Mark Ingram return to practice

Here are your daily New Orleans Saints links

By Adam Dunnells Nov 29, 2021, 5:00am CST

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it looks like the Saints are (gulp)... about 61 million over the agreed-upon (Will be finalized in February) 2022 salary cap will be. that’s a lot of renegotiating to do in order to get underneath it much less in a workable spot where other deals could be considered. Looks like a rookie contract (Book or a drafted player) or an undervalued underpaid veteran (perhaps one coming off an injury like Winston) or Hill will be the likely rout for the Saints at QB next year.

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There are $35 million in 2022 roster bonuses that will likely be converted to signing bonuses and prorated out. This is usual operating procedure for Loomis. There's also $70-$80 million in 2022 base salary that can be converted to signing bonuses in extensions to players that we would like to keep.

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Just saw this. Not willing to pay the subscription fee, but I'm sure he addresses the same factors that I just posted. By the way, the $35 million in roster bonus conversions require no negotiation. They are always team options only. The player gets their money all on the same day regardless.

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Imagine that, COVID in Texas. Go figure. LOL!

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How the Saints can clear $80-90 million in cap space this offseason without cutting anyone
by NICK UNDERHILL :bng:

The prognostications that the salary cap is going to sink the Saints have already started.

If you haven’t already, you’ll soon start seeing graphics and charts showing the team is projected to be about $60-70 million over the 2022 salary cap. A heavy amount, for sure, and one that carries more weight when the team needing to do the trimming is flirting with a .500 record this season.

But getting under the cap this year will not be nearly as difficult as it was last year. Thanks to the spending limit likely increasing to $208 million from $182.5 million, there is a much easier path to cap compliance than last year. The real intrigue will be more about who the Saints decide to retain than who they must cut to make the numbers work.

I’m not expecting the team to look exactly the same next year. Some of the players on the team will likely get moved or released to help clear cap space. The following exercise only shows how New Orleans can rework the current contracts to get under the cap. The purpose of doing this is to show how easily this could all happen if the organization wants to keep the current team together.

I’m also going to take a conservative approach in reworking these numbers. The Saints often get more aggressive, but I’m going to make this work within the current framework of the existing deals.

The first place you always want to look for breathing room is roster bonuses. New Orleans puts these in the future years of contracts and later converts them into signing bonuses. Doing this allows the team to prorate the cap hit over the contract’s life instead of taking it all on at once. This amount can be spread out over five years. The Saints will typically tack on voidable years to maximize the savings in the current year, but I’m only going to use the years on the books while doing this.

Here are the players who have roster bonuses and how much the Saints can save by reworking their deals:

• Marshon Lattimore: $15 million roster bonus. Total savings of $12 million.
• Taysom Hill: $9 million roster bonus. Total savings of $7.2 million.
· Ryan Ramczyk: $8.5 million roster bonus. Total savings of $6.8 million.
• Alvin Kamara: $6 million roster bonus. Total savings of $4.5 million.

Total savings from converting roster bonuses: $30.5 million

Players with big base salaries are also often targeted for cap savings. This process works the same way as the roster bonus. The team can take the base salary, convert it into a signing bonus and prorate the cap hit instead of taking it all on at once. The downside is it pushes money into the future and creates bigger burdens.

Here are some players with high base salaries.

• Michael Thomas. $15.35 million base salary. Total savings of $10.2 million.
• Cam Jordan: $13.6 million base salary. Total savings of $9.1 million.
• Andrus Peat: $10.85 million base salary. Total savings of $7.2 million.
• Ryan Ramczyk: $10.5 million base salary. Total savings of $8.4 million.
• Marshon Lattimore: $9.1 million base salary. Total savings of $7.3 million.
• Bradley Roby: $9.5 million base salary. Total savings of $7.1 million.
• Demario Davis: $7.5 million base salary. Total savings of $5 million.
• David Onyemata: $7.5 million base salary. Total savings of $3.8 million

Total savings from converting base salaries: $58,100,000

Not all of these moves are realistic or wise. Converting someone’s base salary essentially extends your commitment to that player and makes it harder to escape their deals in the future. So, New Orleans will have some decisions to make when moving forward. Roby, for example, is more likely to be released than restructured. His release would create $9.4 million in cap space.

The Saints will also almost certainly add some voidable years to Marcus Davenport’s fifth-year option and lower his $9 million cap hit down to something around $3 or 4 million. That clears at least another $5 million in cap space.

There is an extremely realistic path to clearing $80-90 million in cap space without cutting anyone or doing anything aggressive with the contracts.

The biggest issue this offseason won’t be the cap. It will be on how to handle safety Marcus Williams. The Saints could tag him again, which would cost 120% of the previous salary. New Orleans also has a big decision to make with Terron Armstead. The left tackle will count $12.29 million against the cap whether he is here or not since his deal was tinkered with to create cap space in previous seasons. Keeping him could delay those payments, but it would mean committing to the 30-year-old for a few more years.

There are some big decisions to make, and the cap situation is still complicated and messy, but the problems facing the Saints this upcoming offseason are much easier to answer than the ones from last year. New Orleans can retool, reload and keep this thing rolling if it wants to keep pushing money into the future.

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There sure is a path to getting it done, and Loomis has been a master of it. Still is an awful lot to do and clearing the 61 million still doesn’t leave a lot to spend on the QB position. That was my angle. I’d be surprised in a trade or signing that would add 20 mill or so is my point.

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