Understanding the 2021 NFL Salary Cap Decline: Who Will it Hurt?
Megadeals, headliner free agency signings, and blockbuster trades all have one thing in common. They need an increasing salary cap to function.
NFL teams are restrained by the salary cap and must ration their money out accordingly. The caveat is that the cap rises every year due to growing revenue in the league. Franchises rely on this increase annually, with some teams even going over the cap with the expectation that it will just increase. These increases supply the necessary funds to continue a team’s long-term plans.
But, with a unique situation that ravaged the league’s revenue in 2020, the cap is expected to fall drastically. This means veteran players who usually get to negotiate deals that may be above their worth will not be entertained this season. The NFL’s “middle class” in a matter of speaking will be dealt a serious blow this offseason.
So how did we get here?
The NFL’s salary cap system was first introduced 27 years ago to keep teams from building stacked squads. It has encouraged competitiveness in the league, essentially.
On paper, the salary cap has worked. The Super Bowl was won back-to-back 6 times in the years before the salary cap and has only had 2 repeats since. 1 of which was the Patriots in Super Bowls 38 and 39. Their dynasty was built on team culture and the greatness of Tom Brady rather than an overpowered team, so it’s not the salary cap’s fault for New England’s amazing run.
But the salary cap is facing an issue it’s never seen before in its two and a half decades of existence: A global pandemic. Teams lost out greatly or even completely on ticket sales and this has led to the salary cap’s number being in flux for the first time since the 2011 NFL lockout.
With many sources predicting it to fall under $180 million, down from its $198.2 million in 2020, teams will have fewer resources to work with. Many star players are itching for big extensions, leaving teams more pressed than ever to save money to pay them. This means lowballing free agents and cutting ties with players they view as overpaid. Rookies and benchwarmers are cheaper so they will not have to worry about job security, and stars are simply too valuable. It’s those veterans who play solid football every year, but not quite at a star level that will be worrying this offseason.
Just look at a guy like Sammy Watkins.
He has had one of the most interesting career arcs in the league. Once a budding star at Clemson, Watkins took his talents to Buffalo where he looked to be the answer at WR for the Bills. But injuries struck Watkins in his 2016 season and he had trouble staying on the field. He went to LA and shined in a support role, but his status as a true number 1 receiver was long gone.
Finding his way to Kansas City, Watkins has shown flashes of that star potential from Buffalo. Winning Super Bowl 54 and making crucial plays in that game, the league started to take notice of Watkins again.
Unfortunately, his 2020 campaign was once again filled with injury and his status as a free agent isn’t nearly as highly regarded as it was coming out of 2019. Although he has said he would love to be a Chief again, KC is going to be extremely pressed for money when Patrick Mahomes’ megadeal kicks in in a few years. He’ll likely find a home elsewhere this offseason but will need to take a big pay cut.
With reduced salary cap numbers, there’s simply no way teams will splurge on Watkins and pay him the deal that his potentially elite play warrants. He’ll likely just have to take the best-reduced deal he can find and run with it. For a guy who has a tough time staying on the field, it’s not an ideal situation.
In any other offseason, I could picture a team like Baltimore taking a chance on Watkins and giving him a $10 million per year kind of deal. But this isn’t any year; Watkins will likely have to sign for nearly half of that. For a guy who many expected would get paid like a top WR, this decreased salary cap is hurting players like him everywhere.
However, there is a silver lining in this for teams. Instead of having to compete for Watkins in a market that would normally give him around $10 million per year, Baltimore will be able to swoop him up for around 5 or 6 million dollars simply because the market won’t be as aggressive due to limited funds. Players will likely stop focusing on the money as much (because it will be reduced wherever they go), and instead flock to contending teams they really want to go to.
For those 2nd tier teams like Baltimore, Seattle, Miami, Buffalo, etc., they may be able to get some quality veteran talent for cheaper than usual. For example, Seattle and Buffalo both are in the market for quality pass rushers. They may be able to lure mid-tier pass rushers like Leonard Floyd and Trey Hendrickson to their cities, not because they’ll pay them ridiculous money, but because they can contend. In some weird, convoluted way, the salary cap decreasing may make the league top-heavier.
Teams will have to restructure their personnel and likely cut solid players to accommodate this odd salary cap, but it isn’t the end for them. Quality veteran talent is on sale and when free agency opens on March 17, teams will be shopping aggressively to recoup the talent they lost.
Any way this plays out, 2021 is sure to be one weird offseason. Aside from the QB carousel and various trade scenarios currently in the works, the altered salary cap is sure to provide some unexpected twists this offseason.
