Bills dead cap number '18 to '19

[eball]

3 hours ago, BullBuchanan said:

it was unprecedentedly reckless and an unnecessary waste of assets.

 

 

It was new management shaping the roster the way they see fit.  Nothing more, nothing less.  If you personally disagree with how they went about it that's fine, but it was neither "unprecedented" nor "reckless."  Whether it is successful remains to be seen, however many indicators appear to be pointing up.

[Magox]

6 hours ago, formerlyofCtown said:

No they didnt.  They didnt sign Dareus to that contract. They did what was necessary to get our team where it is currently.

 

You guys are having a really hard time with the quotation marks

[Buffalo Boy]

13 minutes ago, Magox said:

 

You guys are having a really hard time with the quotation marks

Wh”at are yo”u” insinuating???

[Big Turk]

8 hours ago, Ol Dirty B said:

 

Kelvin was such a better fit than Sammy.

 

They also blamed the dead cap stuff on Whaley. Which I kind of find annoying. They have this year and next year and if they don't win they should be out of here. The both of them

 

That said I disagreed with some of the departures i think they have done good in some regards. However, depleting your WR and Oline should not be forgotten. And the Peterman crap is another level of stuff that they somehow get a pass on.

And they made the playoffs their first year while doing all that with a team nowhere near playoff level

[aristocrat]

5 hours ago, BullBuchanan said:

Except they paid a negligible amount less to keep him than to dump him. The fact that they couldn't deal with whatever flaws they perceived he Watkins and Darby had is more of an indictment of the staff than the players in my book. A lot of jokers cheered the Ryan O'Reilly trade from Buffalo too, and that didn't work out so well.

Maybe they get lucky and the big money deals they paid out to underachievers like Star and Murphy pan out and one or both of Allen/Edmunds starts to flourish, and then all is forgotten and forgiven. Still, it was unprecedentedly reckless and an unnecessary waste of assets.

And what did all those cap savings buy them? Mitch Morse, John Brown, and Cole Beasley? I hardly see that as worth it. As it is they're going into the season with $22M of unused (wasted) cap, because they didn't make any moves to sign marquee players and they're at a point where there's nobody on the team worth using to money on to lock up in an extension.

 

It's just not smart business. I don't like being down on the team, but the amount of backslapping over these guys is just ridiculous. They were hailed as geniuses before they even set foot in the door, and I just don't think they've done anything to deserve that yet.

 

The three you guys you mentioned Morse brown and Beasley haven’t even played yet. You’ve already made your mind up before they played a down?  This is classic! 

[End The Drought]

On 7/29/2019 at 3:42 PM, Bangarang said:

 

I don’t recall people saying it was unnecessary, but it is true that their moves are what contributed to the dead cap problem.

 

Regardless, creating cap space isn’t an accomplishment. Any idiot GM can cut players and make cap room. Where this staff is going to get judged the most is in Allen’s development and the number of games we win. 

 

Lol this is true but it takes guts to cut some of your most talented guys the first year you take over the team. 

[formerlyofCtown]

1 hour ago, Magox said:

 

You guys are having a really hard time with the quotation marks

Quotation marks?  You mean apostrophe.  If you're going to critique people then you should probably know what you're talking about.

[K-9]

I love how the word “unnecessary” gets tossed around when describing how McBeane created a record amount of dead cap space.  

 

McBeane, for good or bad, had a plan, determined who was essential to that plan, and executed it; they decided what was “necessary” to carry it out. The creation of all that dead cap money was simply a function of them doing what they felt was “necessary” to achieve their desired results. The word “unnecessary” simply doesn’t apply. It was absolutely necessary for them.

 

Quibble all you want about it being right, wrong, or a mix of the two, but that’s a different argument. Disagree about letting go of talented players that you liked and don’t think they should have been let go, but that is entirely beside the point relative to their plan for the rebuild. 

 

And nobody knows the result at this point. That should be obvious to everybody.

[SoCal Deek]

You guys can go back and forth all day long but THIS is the year to judge if the team’s heading in the right direction. The house has been cleared. The no longer rookie QB has been given the keys. Now....we’ll see.

[Magox]

1 hour ago, formerlyofCtown said:

Quotation marks?  You mean apostrophe.  If you're going to critique people then you should probably know what you're talking about.

 

Stop being a goober.   

[MR8]

The Bills set out to rebuild by cutting the fat... removed bloated contracts with under performing players.  Then this year they decided to be "Judicious"... it has been fantastic management of the cap, and the fact of the matter is that the Bills have needed to do a purge of contracts and players for decades and hit the "reset" button on this thing but no one coming in had the courage, or the green light to do so.  Hitting that reset button usually means being TERRIBLE right out of the gate... and in 2017, I think that's what they were prepared for.  But because of luck, and a team that overachieved, they snuck into the playoffs. 

 

That actually cost us a bit because we needed to spend extra resources to go up for Allen... regardless though it was the start of the rebuild but gave people a lot of hope and gave McBeane the rope to bottom out a bit in 2018 with all that dead cap coming home to roost. 

 

Now we are coming out of that dark age of big bloated contracts, and we are looking at plenty of space moving forward to ORGANICALLY grow our roster through the draft and keep our own guys.

 

In 2019 just as in 2018 and 2017 the Bills have been adding Free Agents to 1 year or multi-year TEAM FRIENDLY contracts.  It's again fantastic cap management.  They can get out from under just about every contract they signed this year for minimal cap penalties.  Morse, Beasley, and Brown are the only 3 that would cost us to move on from, the rest are deals that we can be out of immediately or by 2020 if we want to opt out.  

 

It's tough because we will still have lots of turn over in 2020 as we let some of the guys added this year go, but it gives us time to figure out who want long term... guys like Jordan Phillips, Spain, Long, Nsekhe, Felicano, Kevin Johnson, EJ Gaines all are in deals that are short term and allow us to evaluate these guys and get out from under them if necessary.  Very refreshing to see a team properly manage the cap and the players we bring in.

 

In 2020 we're projected to have $49M in cap space, that will probably go up with some of our cuts we will be making of vets signed this year who don't make the team.  That opens us up to extending some of the affore mentioned players as we see fit, and maybe adding one or two FAs to help us in the short term.  But the way they've build this team, it's pretty obvious they aren't looking for "Splash" FAs, they want to keep their own.  I want to see another "Judicious" off-season in 2020 and hold money to be able to retain the likes of Poyer, White, Hyde & Milano who are going to be the first of the McBeane building blocks to come up for new contracts in 2021 and 2022. 

[eball]

But @MR8 -- I'm reading in this thread that what Beane did was "unprecedented, reckless, and unnecessary!"

 

I guess I would agree that for the Bills managing the cap well IS unprecedented! 

 

[MR8]

4 minutes ago, eball said:

But @MR8 -- I'm reading in this thread that what Beane did was "unprecedented, reckless, and unnecessary!"

 

I guess I would agree that for the Bills managing the cap well IS unprecedented! 

 

 

yeah it's definitely something the Bills haven't done, but ignoring it for 2 decades and kicking the can down the road by constantly restructuring is how you get into the trouble we were in. 

 

Making the moves Beane made IMO were entirely necessary to wash away mismanagement of the past and put us on a path of proper judicious management.  I know people won't necessarily agree, but that's how I feel. 

 

[PromoTheRobot]

7 hours ago, BullBuchanan said:

Except they paid a negligible amount less to keep him than to dump him. The fact that they couldn't deal with whatever flaws they perceived he Watkins and Darby had is more of an indictment of the staff than the players in my book. A lot of jokers cheered the Ryan O'Reilly trade from Buffalo too, and that didn't work out so well.

Maybe they get lucky and the big money deals they paid out to underachievers like Star and Murphy pan out and one or both of Allen/Edmunds starts to flourish, and then all is forgotten and forgiven. Still, it was unprecedentedly reckless and an unnecessary waste of assets.

And what did all those cap savings buy them? Mitch Morse, John Brown, and Cole Beasley? I hardly see that as worth it. As it is they're going into the season with $22M of unused (wasted) cap, because they didn't make any moves to sign marquee players and they're at a point where there's nobody on the team worth using to money on to lock up in an extension.

 

It's just not smart business. I don't like being down on the team, but the amount of backslapping over these guys is just ridiculous. They were hailed as geniuses before they even set foot in the door, and I just don't think they've done anything to deserve that yet.

 

So keeping some cap space free for unforseen situations is wasting it? Glad you aren't running this team.

[formerlyofCtown]

47 minutes ago, Magox said:

 

Stop being a goober.   

Who's being a goober?  I wasn't the one that wanted to give English lessons on an internet board for football.

[MR8]

7 hours ago, BullBuchanan said:

Except they paid a negligible amount less to keep him than to dump him. The fact that they couldn't deal with whatever flaws they perceived he Watkins and Darby had is more of an indictment of the staff than the players in my book. A lot of jokers cheered the Ryan O'Reilly trade from Buffalo too, and that didn't work out so well.

Maybe they get lucky and the big money deals they paid out to underachievers like Star and Murphy pan out and one or both of Allen/Edmunds starts to flourish, and then all is forgotten and forgiven. Still, it was unprecedentedly reckless and an unnecessary waste of assets.

And what did all those cap savings buy them? Mitch Morse, John Brown, and Cole Beasley? I hardly see that as worth it. As it is they're going into the season with $22M of unused (wasted) cap, because they didn't make any moves to sign marquee players and they're at a point where there's nobody on the team worth using to money on to lock up in an extension.

 

It's just not smart business. I don't like being down on the team, but the amount of backslapping over these guys is just ridiculous. They were hailed as geniuses before they even set foot in the door, and I just don't think they've done anything to deserve that yet.

 

Honestly, you may be right, Allen and Edmunds may not pan out... will you feel good watching those guys fail, and with them this franchise just so you can pat yourself on the fanny and say "See see I told you so"?

 

So they keep Watkins and Darby... Watkins has a middling season, and they let him walk in free agency anyways, Darby was hurt that year with Philly so he likely would've been hurt here too (freak injury so could happen anywhere)... so instead of having the draft picks which were used to go up and get Allen and Edmunds, instead we just have a FA WR who walks, and an injured CB who wouldn't have been available even as much as EJ Gaines was for us in 2017.

 

So fast forward to the draft... the only way we get to draft Allen would be giving up both our 1sts for him since we wouldn't have that extra 3rd or 2nd... we gave up our 1st (#12) and both seconds for Allen... So if you don't have both of those, you end up giving up both firsts instead.  So now you're paying an even higher premium for Allen AND You don't get Edmunds at all... 

 

How is your scenario better than what they did?  I mean seriously answer that... how is dumping a WR you weren't going to re-sign anyways, and moving a CB to add draft picks to ENSURE you get your franchise QB in the draft a bad move? 

 

If you don't have a QB in this league you have NOTHING! TT was not the guy, so we moved a guy on borrowed time (Watkins) and a great CB in Darby but someone we already replaced in the draft to enable us to have enough ammunition to get a franchise QB.... We still would've moved up for Allen regardless in the 2018 draft, but had we not made that move, we would never have been able to get up for him and Edmunds... we likely would've had to give up both 1sts for Allen instead... 

 

Making the moves they did to clear cap from guys like Cordy Glenn, who Cincy moved to OG until their rookie LT got hurt, Watkins, who LA didn't retain just like the Bills wouldn't have, Dareus, who everyone admitted needed a change of scenery as he stopped trying here... the only piece we lost that was a solid player who'd still be here is Darby, but we've replaced him pretty nicely as it is.  I honestly don't know where you're deciding removing these guys didn't make us better... #2 Defense int he NFL last year... didn't seem to miss Darby or Dareus.

 

Sure we could use Watkins, BUT HE WASN'T GOING TO BE RE-SIGNED HERE ANWYAYS!!!!

 

You say we have no one worth giving big contracts to, I entirely disagree, but we have the benefit of NOT HAVING TO.  That's a good thing... we have a good young football team with talent on rookie contracts.  It's a good thing when you aren't stuck paying people boat loads of money.  And we aren't hamstrung by deals for the next 5-6 years... we have flexibility so if some of these young guys don't pan out we still CAN sign FAs if necessary.

 

If Murphy isn't as good as they signed him to be, they will likely opt out of this 3rd year of his TEAM FRIENDLY deal, with a cap hit of just $1.75M in 2020 and savings of $7.2M for 2020 which will be reallocated to signing someone else in FA.  That's the beauty of how they're doing business versus handing out money like a broken slot machine and praying guys pan out because you're stuck with them for 5 years.

[ngbills]

Here is what is ironic.

 

We want to give the McBeane team credit for making the playoffs in year one. Then we want say year two was supposed to be terrible and they had to get rid of all the terrible players. That means year one and the playoffs was not part of McBeane's plans because they did not want those guys. In my book the prior regime gets more credit for that roster and they had some luck sneaking in the playoffs. If this is not a playoff team within a couple years this regime is a failure.

[MR8]

48 minutes ago, ngbills said:

Here is what is ironic.

 

We want to give the McBeane team credit for making the playoffs in year one. Then we want say year two was supposed to be terrible and they had to get rid of all the terrible players. That means year one and the playoffs was not part of McBeane's plans because they did not want those guys. In my book the prior regime gets more credit for that roster and they had some luck sneaking in the playoffs. If this is not a playoff team within a couple years this regime is a failure.

 

IMO they thought they were going to be 3-13 in 2017, I think McDermott was prepared to tank it out HARD in that first year.  Cut players, eat dead cap in 2017 and 2018, and then turn this thing around.  But something happened, the stars aligned where other teams were bad too, and on top of that our team outperformed expectations and even what McDermott thought they'd do.

 

Then in a miracle catch, the Bills got swept into the playoffs on luck, rather than being the bottom of the league team everyone, McDermott included, though't they'd be.  They were shooting for a top 3 pick in the 2018 draft so they could add their QB of the future, and they collected draft picks along the way so they could rebuild the roster through the draft.  However those wins that made us all so happy, hurt their draft strategy.  But they were fine with it, they went so far as to add that waste of space Benji right before the deadline to make a push for the playoffs.  So they embraced it, when they found themselves in the hunt.  But some questionable decisions like starting Peterman were still made.

 

I think they do deserve credit for their bold attempt to bottom out in 2017... they dumped talent for draft picks and shed salary knowing they'd eat the cap penalties in 2018 in preparation for 2019 and beyond.  The thing is, it didn't work out the way they thought it would because they surprisingly won games in 2017.   Something no one saw coming... which is all a part of the parody of the NFL and why tanking doesn't always work... 

 

They smartly still stockpiled draft picks, which enabled them to move up to get Allen still, but had their tank worked, they'd have been picking high enough to just take him, whiles till having all those other draft picks for more young talent rather than needing to trade up.

 

I give them lots of credit... they had a plan to tank, when it didn't go that way they still had a plan to get their QB the following year by moving up in the draft.  They have every avenue covered to make sure they could get their QB and build around that QB in the draft and by shedding cap to sign FAs in the short term while they drafted their replacements over time. 

 

I give zero credit to the previous regime for making the playoffs in 2017, most of the best players they'd added were gone by then, and now just about all of them are gone, and I don't see a lot of people saying "Wow I wish we had the 2016 roster instead".

 

[ngbills]

1 hour ago, MR8 said:

 

IMO they thought they were going to be 3-13 in 2017, I think McDermott was prepared to tank it out HARD in that first year.  Cut players, eat dead cap in 2017 and 2018, and then turn this thing around.  But something happened, the stars aligned where other teams were bad too, and on top of that our team outperformed expectations and even what McDermott thought they'd do.

 

Then in a miracle catch, the Bills got swept into the playoffs on luck, rather than being the bottom of the league team everyone, McDermott included, though't they'd be.  They were shooting for a top 3 pick in the 2018 draft so they could add their QB of the future, and they collected draft picks along the way so they could rebuild the roster through the draft.  However those wins that made us all so happy, hurt their draft strategy.  But they were fine with it, they went so far as to add that waste of space Benji right before the deadline to make a push for the playoffs.  So they embraced it, when they found themselves in the hunt.  But some questionable decisions like starting Peterman were still made.

 

I think they do deserve credit for their bold attempt to bottom out in 2017... they dumped talent for draft picks and shed salary knowing they'd eat the cap penalties in 2018 in preparation for 2019 and beyond.  The thing is, it didn't work out the way they thought it would because they surprisingly won games in 2017.   Something no one saw coming... which is all a part of the parody of the NFL and why tanking doesn't always work... 

 

They smartly still stockpiled draft picks, which enabled them to move up to get Allen still, but had their tank worked, they'd have been picking high enough to just take him, whiles till having all those other draft picks for more young talent rather than needing to trade up.

 

I give them lots of credit... they had a plan to tank, when it didn't go that way they still had a plan to get their QB the following year by moving up in the draft.  They have every avenue covered to make sure they could get their QB and build around that QB in the draft and by shedding cap to sign FAs in the short term while they drafted their replacements over time. 

 

I give zero credit to the previous regime for making the playoffs in 2017, most of the best players they'd added were gone by then, and now just about all of them are gone, and I don't see a lot of people saying "Wow I wish we had the 2016 roster instead".

 

Disagree.

 

On offense - The QB, RB, OL and TE were all carryovers. The guys the new regime tried were all failures - Peterman, KB, Matthews, Z Jones, etc did not help this team. 

On Defense - The additions of Poyer and Hyde were positive as was rookie Tre White eventually. But again, much of the core was the same - williams, hughes, p brown, l alexander...

[Thurman#1]

On 7/30/2019 at 4:42 AM, ScottLaw said:

It's not really complicated.

 

They got rid of guys they had no attachment to creating a ***** ton of dead cap space.

 

They now have a roster of guys they want and aren't cutting players who were paid from the previous regime, hence not a lot of dead cap space.... whether that roster is actually good or not is yet to be determined.

 

 

 

Nope.

 

You keep trying to sell this old dead fish of a narrative, and nobody's buying. It was never true in the first place, as you keep ignoring the fact of the rebuild, the fact that we were in awful cap shape and struggling to bring it under control and the fact that we were desperate to bring in a franchise QB and had to get draft capital to have a chance of doing this. Those all had huge repercussions in terms of dead cap space.

 

You're right that it's not rocket science, but it is far more complicated than you're pretending. A quick example is that a very nice chunk of that dead money was from Eric Wood and Richie Incognito. Aaron Williams' injuries. Dareus' inability to get his ass on the bus. Your self-serving and over-simplistic idea somehow leaves them out and a lot of other factors that don't happen to fit your narrative.

 

They were in horrible cap shape. Really really bad cap shape, and especially so for a team that wasn't winning a lot of games. Beane promised the Pegulas in their job interview that they would get the team into good cap shape by the beginning of the 2019 season.

 

At the same time, they desperately needed a franchise QB, and not having a high draft pick, that essentially meant trading guys off for picks that they could then use to trade up for that franchise QB.

 

Luckily, getting draft capital and clearing up a horrible cap can both be accomplished with the same technique. The basic strategy is rebuilding. You will suck for two years or so and after that you have a chance to improve. The relevant part of the rebuild is that you trade away (or even cut if you can't get anything for 'em) guys who are either costing you a lot of money, are going to do so in the future, or will soon cost a lot to re-sign. You don't do it with all your guys, but ones who don't fit your culture (Dareus), or aren't living up to their draft status or expected contract figures (Watkins) are easy choices.

 

And it gets immediately worse when you are forced to cut guys the way we were

 

And the tough and painful part of the rebuild is that when you're that far behind the eight ball in your cap and have to get in good shape fast, you will have to cut even some guys you would really like to keep. But can't afford. Like Stephon Gilmore and Robert Woods. It's a sad byproduct of being handed a poorly handled cap.

 

Another is that if you want everything off the books as soon as possible, you can trade guys early so the hit all comes that year, or you can trade them late and choose to NOT pass any dead cap on to the next year. This actively transfers money from your next year's cap (2019 and 2020) to this year's cap (2018 in this case), and they did it in most of last year's cuts/trades. It fit the timing of the rebuild and the timing for cleaning up the cap they'd given to the Pegulas.

Edited August 1, 2019 by Thurman#1