Jack Vegas

Was looking at this last night. Currently $11.13 million over for next year.

-Cutting Will Smith alone will get you under the cap, but that is before signing any free agents.

-Cutting Harper is another 2.1 million. I wouldn't be surprised if Jenkins is gone as well, that's 1.65 million.

-As much as we all like Lance Moore, is he really worth his contract? Cutting him is another 2.5 million, although I think we would see him restructured rather than cut outright.

-The contract that is really killing this team right now is Ben Grubbs. IMO. His cap number is over 9.1 million and his performance is maybe worth 1/3 of that. Cutting him would provide almost no cap savings, but I think he would be a major candidate for a pay cut restructure.

-I am hardly an expert but from what I gather roughly 90% of Brees' 10.75 million base salary can be converted to signing bonus. So let's call that 9 million savings.

-I love Jabari Greer. I would absolutely hate to see him go. But we have a true #1 corner and multiple candidates for a good #2. This would save 3.175 million.


I am using the calculator at Salary Cap Calculator - Over the Cap . That doesn't account for all the various loopholes in the cap structure like dead money rollover that Loomis exploits every year, nor does it account for the cap increase next year which should be 3 or 4 million. BUT, I think it gives you a pretty good idea how we could go from 11 million over to 20 million under, giving us a fair amount of money to sign our own guys. Strief, Haralson, De la Puente, Graham, Collins, Bush are the guys that strike me as worth being re-signed.

As long as we have Brees there is a window to be competitive. I think a lot like the Colts with Peyton Manning, you keep pushing it back and pushing it back, then when he goes you blow the team up, take it on the nose for one year and put yourself back in position to be good again after a rebuild.