Quote: @AGRforever said:
Heres a cap question. When teams do these deals do they count the whole total (salary and potential bonuses) against the cap since its possible they have to pay it in a best case scenario?
Likely to be earned incentives are accounted for against the cap in the current year. Otherwise unlikely to be earned incentives are credited/debited from the subsequent year cap. The barometer on what is likely to be earned is how the player performed in the previous year.
So we can use Richardson as an example.
In 2018 his cap hit will be $8M with the potential to earn $11M. The extra $3M is broken out as:
1. $666,667 for greater than six sacks but less than 8
2. An additional $666,667 ($1,333,333 total) for 8 or more sacks
3. And a final additional escalator of $666,667 ($2,000,000 total) for 10 or more sacks
1. $500K for achieving a Pro Bowl nomination
2. $500K for achieving being named first team All-Pro
If he achieves any of these, the money will be subtracted from the 2019 salary cap.
But if you would manipulate it a bit just to give you a comparison, say that his first sack incentive was for 2 or more sacks. Since Richardson achieved that in 2017 his cap hit this season would have been $8,666,667M since it would likely be earned. But say that he only got one sack in 2018, is it money lost? No. The opposite holds true where that $666,667 would be added to the Vikings 2019 salary cap since they did not pay Richardson that money.
What always holds true with the cap is that the cash dollars also end up equaling the cap hits. It is just a matter of how long a team wants to carry the money.
