BMitch & Finlay react to what the NFL's huge salary cap increase could mean for certain teams or players
The NFL salary cap is going up once again and it could be as high as $281.5 million – which would be a $27.1 million increase from last year's $255.4 million, right after a record $30.6 million jump from $224.8 million the year before.
As JP Finlay explained, a league memo said the reason is due to a $10 million decrease from last year's projected cap to spread out some needed increases from the COVID era, but wherever it lands for 2025, it'll be at least $277.5 million, meaning the cap has gone up more than $50 million in two years.
Maybe the perfect time for the Commanders to have all this space and a QB on a rookie deal?
"This isn't the government, so they don't have to provide this, but based on Over the Cap, the Commanders had about $68 million in effective salary cap space at a base cap of $272 million," JP Finlay said. "So maybe the cap space jumps up another eight or nine? That's a lot of money, man, but I don't think it's going to land in a straight up spending spree."
"Yeah, I don't think Adam Peters is a 'go spend just to spend' guy – every time he spends, he's telling you he's spending for a reason," BMitch replied. "If they ever feel like something pops up with the right person, they'll go for it again, but everything they do is going to have some meaning behind it, which is something we haven't seen here a lot."
JP wondered if the cap increase means the Rams are likely to be eating some money, so Matthew Stafford, for example, is going to somewhere where he'll be playing for more than $4 million guaranteed, or Cooper Kupp will be elsewhere…perhaps Washington?
"Players get bashed for wanting to get more, but the more you get, the less stress you have in this league," BMitch said. "With Kupp, it's played itself to a point where people know you're gonna have to release him, and they're like, well, we're not giving you nothing for that. Now, if someone decides to go and do it and bail them out, as we've seen a lot of dumb people do, maybe, but most teams are gonna say, you know what, we'll wait. We'll see."
