Quote:
Originally Posted by IndyNorm
Hey Sherck. You probably know this. Per the CBA don't team has to spend a percentage of the cap? I want to say off the top of my head it's ~10%. If true then there's no way we get to that minimum spend threshold without dipping into FA.
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A team has to spend a minimum of 90% of the cap over a rolling five year period.
That does mean that you can spend a year or two spending under the 90% but then you pretty much have to spend it all in order to bring the rolling five year up to the 90% threshold or else end up having to pay a fine to the players association for "lost revenue" to their players.
CLE had an adjusted 2016 cap of $176.686m this year due to having rolled $20m over from 2015. They only ended up spending $130.750m in 2016 leaving an unspent amount of $46.1m that will be rolling into 2017.
That means that in 2015, they only spent 86.98%% of cap and in 2016, they only spent 74.00% of cap. That means that over the next three seasons, they need to spent at least 96.34% of cap per season in order to hit their 90% over the rolling five years.
That translates into:
$168.000m = Projected 2017 NFL salary cap
$046.123m = 2016 unspent rollover from 2016
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$214.123m = 2017 Cleveland Browns salary cap
$102.970m = Cap Hit of current top 51 players
$008.000m = Draft Class / slots 52 & 53 / Practice Squad / Churn space
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$110.970m = Current 2017 Obligations
$103.153m = Cap Space available to sign free agents
$099.378m = Amount needed to be spent ON FREE AGENTS in order to hit their 96.34%
As the players association hoped for, player salaries are going to have to rise just in order to use up the cap space.
I am unsure as to how the "fine" is determined that teams will have to pay the PA if they fall under the rolling 90% floor.
I doubt it is a 1 for 1 exchange so, in the long run, it will financially benefit the teams to fall under the 90% if that strategy fulfills their team's needs rather than spend money just to spend it.
Cheers,