On Monday, the NFL and NFLPA agreed on a cap ceiling of $208.2 million for the 2022 season. That doesn’t mean the cap will be set at $208.2 million. It just can’t go any higher. If the NFL makes more money than they think, the extra will go into paying back benefits that were going to be delayed further thanks to COVID-19. For what it’s worth, OverTheCap.com has been working with a $203 million estimate.
The Minnesota Vikings, along with many teams, have borrowed from future years to get under a reduced 2021 salary cap number. The NFL made less revenue in a pandemic year, so the cap went down. Teams like the New Orleans Saints had to gut their roster to get under. The Vikings had to make sacrifices of their own, releasing Kyle Rudolph and Riley Reiff. They signed a myriad of one-year deals that will become to-do items next offseason. They also had to structure their biggest free-agent signing, Dalvin Tomlinson, using void years.
Void years are an accounting trick teams can use to lower the first year of a contract’s cap hit without asking the player to take less money. Instead of a two-year, $21 million contract, the Vikings signed him to a five-year, $21 million contract. The last three years are $0 years, and Tomlinson won’t play on them. His $12.5 million signing bonus prorates over five years instead of two. It spreads that much thinner now. So he’ll be “cut” after two years of his contract, incurring a dead cap hit in 2023 after he departs.
More simply, Tomlinson will cost the Vikings in 2023 so that he can be a little cheaper in 2021. It’s a credit card advance, which only makes sense if you expect to come into some extra cash. Since the cap is expected to accelerate, teams are incentivized to take out those advances. If the cap hits that $208 million ceiling, only a few teams stand to be punished as of now.
As it stands, the Vikings will have about $190.6 million in cap liabilities when the 2022 league year begins. They’ll actually be on the hook for $201 million in salary, but only $190.6 million of that is included in their “top 51” contracts. The league doesn’t make you manage a 90-man roster under a 53-man salary cap. That $190.6 million includes Kirk Cousins‘ infamous $45 million cap hit.
The Grocery list
The Vikings had comparatively little work to do going into 2022 until free agency hit. The only two starters with expiring contracts were Brian O’Neill and Harrison Smith. Both have begun extension talks, which would eat into that projected $17.5 million in salary cap space. But the Vikings had many roster holes in the 2021 offseason and addressed those with one-year deals. Anthony Barr, Patrick Peterson, Xavier Woods, Mackensie Alexander, and Stephen Weatherly are all penciled-in starters that will need to be extended or replaced. Rashod Hill could win a job on a one-year deal as well. There’s also a likely Danielle Hunter pay raise, if not a full-on replacement.
Call that seven holes the Vikings have to fill. They don’t have to fill them all in free agency, and some may fill themselves. Minnesota won’t look to sign a starting-caliber free-agent tackle a year after drafting Christian Darrisaw. Jeff Gladney represents several outcomes, but among them is a six-game suspension that would be in the past by then. At any rate, we’ll know more about those players by the time the Vikings have to decide on them.
The salary cap was expected to expand by 2022. That it could expand by over $27 million will only help the Vikings deal with this grocery list. The NFL and NFLPA agreed on a cap floor in 2021, and the Vikings operated as though the cap would be that floor. The two parties had to agree on a ceiling implies a lot of optimism about the cap in future years. That means more void years, more one-year deals, and more restructures. More cash is coming in, so we can borrow against that future.
The quarterback situation
Ultimately, the cap won’t decide Kirk Cousins’ fate, Kellen Mond will. But setting that aside, the Vikings have some options with Cousins. There are two main ones: an extension to lower his 2022 cap hit but commit to more seasons, or a trade that offloads most, but not all, of his fully guaranteed deal. There’s a third, unspoken option: do nothing. Cousins will count for a whopping $45 million in 2022. For the level Kirk plays at, that’s a significant overpay. But outside of the principle of it, what if that’s not a problem?
Taking a maximally optimistic look at the young Vikings, they could replace Stephen Weatherly with Patrick Jones by mid-season. The three sophomore cornerbacks might be more reliable than we think. They have multiple projects from this year’s draft that are aimed at taking over for expensive starters. If all they need to do is extend O’Neill, Smith, and maybe Xavier Woods, they might not need to borrow from Cousins’ contract. If they feel good about where Mond will be after two years, they could let this work out naturally.
That may not be the most efficient way to spend their money, but if they need to buy another developmental year for Mond, that option exists. It probably won’t be anyone’s favorite.
The Danielle Hunter Situation
It’s yet unclear whether Danielle Hunter will hold out for a new contract or not. Let’s assume he does and that the Vikings have to deal with that one way or another. The confirmation of a higher cap can allow the Vikings to be more aggressive in any offers they extend to Hunter. They can also rely on the implied increases for 2023 and 2024 to backload the cap hits of the extension with signing bonuses or intended restructures.
Right now, the tension between the Vikings and Hunter comes down to risk and Hunter’s injury. With more money available, risks become more acceptable. With more certainty that the cap will go up, there’s less concern about taking a risk on Hunter’s health. That could be the catalyst that spells the difference between Hunter playing his third contract here or elsewhere.
The Vikings operated under the assumption that the cap would go up significantly in 2022 and beyond. Now that we can be that much more certain about how much it will go up, Minnesota can make more-informed decisions about extensions. That will affect future cap casualties, free agency decisions, and even the draft. With a better sense of the NFL’s revenue expectations, we can predict those with much more specificity.
