Stuck with Star's contract ?

[First Round Bust]

most of us want to move on from Star, but according to Joe B (Athletic - small extract below) likely have to keep one more year...

 

warning lots of math and accounting ...not for those easily bored with facts and budgets who want to sign free sexy agents.

 

We have just learned...because of his salary renegotiation before he opted out, $2.5 million of his base salary was automatically guaranteed for the upcoming season, now would be taking a dead-money cap hit of $7.7 million and basically robbing themselves of both the cap space and the player. due to only $700,000 in potential cap savings, it may not add up to releasing him outright.

 

Bills can make the best of a difficult situation by negotiating a pay cut with Lotulelei for 2022.

Even though Lotulelei’s play wasn’t as good late in the season, his value to the Bills is likely worth much more than $700k in cap space they’d save.

 

By cutting and replace with someone who hasn’t been in their system or is inexperienced and likely at a similar cost to the cap space saved. That should be motivation enough to strike a renegotiated deal with Lotulelei. From the player’s perspective, as a 32-year-old, his best chance for maximizing his money is likely in Buffalo.

 

base salary for 2022 is $6.15 million, $2.5 million of which is already guaranteed. If Bills ask Lotulelei to reduce that base salary by $1.5 million to $2 million and ensure the remainder, that would lock in Lotulelei between $4.15 million and $4.65 million guaranteed for the upcoming season with the chance to earn $350,000 more in per-game roster bonuses.

 

Star likely would not come close to $4.15 million to $5 million on the open market and team already saves a minimum of $1.5 million on the 2022 salary cap, more than double what they would have saved by releasing him outright, plus they get to keep the player.

 

Additionally, can convert all but around $1 million of that renegotiated salary into a signing bonus and prorate it over the next two seasons. A negotiated pay cut of $1.5 million and that base salary conversion would save Bills a total of around $3.3 million on the 2022 cap, more than quadruple what they would save by releasing Lotulelei outright.

 

Reduces 2023 cap savings to move on from Lotulelei, they would still be able to save about $4.5 million to cut him next offseason...can kick the can down the road another year and not have to draft a DT with a higher pick this year  given Oliver's ascension (likely to pick up option) Harry (hoping to resign) Zimmer (depth- rehab ACL) Bryan (resigned for two year not just one - two pressures on 15 pass rushes plus position flex) and now Star...other than mid-late round PS stash would could be poached by other teams

 

[White Linen]

In

[Don Otreply]

   It’s pretty simple, Star is a Buffalo Bill this upcoming season, unless he retires.
 

  It will cost to much to cut him in our current fiscal situation. He has very little trade value with his current level of play and contract as it is, and he has no compelling reason to renegotiate his contract.  

 

   Everyone needs to get comfortable with this reality. There is no pie in the sky fantasy that will change this from what it is.  

[BarleyNY]

I’ve discussed this at length.  @First Round Bust I skimmed your post and it looks correct.  I don’t see any kind of reworking of Star’s contract though.  He has little reason to do so.  The two realistic options are:

 

1) Keep him this year, cut him next.

2) Designate him a 6/1 release prior to his roster bonus that is due on 3/26.

 

The first option is if the team really wants to move on now.  The second is if they don’t think they can swing replacing him this off-season.  The difference in spend and cap hit is $4.1M savings this season.  That’s all this really boils down to.

 

They probably keep him one more season on his current contract. 

Edited February 22, 2022 by BarleyNY

[Rock-A-Bye Beasley]

Yes, star is coming back and he’s going to fix the defense. This is one of the worst contracts I’ve ever seen from the moment it was signed to the restructure to the opt-out.
 

Now we have one more year before Allen’s contract goes to 40+mil and this albatross is still here. 

[BuffaloRebound]

I guess we gotta trust McBeane on this one.  On the surface, a post June 1 release looks like a no brainer given Star’s lack of availability.  But McBeane brought him here on a big contract, then doubled down on a re-structure.  So unless his lack of availability the past 2 years altered their opinion of him, I assume he’ll be back.  

[First Round Bust]

14 hours ago, BigAl2526 said:

I'd be happy with Williams.  There would be some development that would need to happen, but he's got the freakish athleticism to make one drool.   My guess is he would not be a huge producer in his rookie year, but a team that is patient might have a real game breaker in a couple years.  It Buffalo didn't draft Williams, they might take a look at Calvin Austin III a bit later in the draft.  He's smaller - 5'9" but has a Tyreek Hill like skill set and speed.  He'll likely be the fastest prospect in the draft.

 

1 hour ago, BarleyNY said:

I’ve discussed this at length.  @First Round Bust I skimmed your post and it looks correct.  I don’t see any kind of reworking of Star’s contract though.  He has little reason to do so.  The two realistic options are:

 

1) Keep him this year, cut him next.

2) Designate him a 6/1 release prior to his roster bonus that is due on 3/26.

 

The first option is if the team really wants to move on now.  The second is if they don’t think they can swing replacing him this off-season.  The difference in spend and cap hit is $4.1M savings this season.  That’s all this really boils down to.

 

They probably keep him one more season on his current contract. 

 

yeah, this would be the second requested pay-cut for Star and likely as well as for Morse. which if neither bite would likely mean the release of Morse, which is not how McBeane like to operate given no existing replacement for Morse (other than Feliciano who is likely to be cut as well)...

[DCofNC]

I think the OP has a point, but it depends on how ballsy Star feels,  if he says “no, go ahead and release me” the Bills lose the cap space and he loses money.  So will they follow through?  He stands to do nothing but lose money if he renegotiates.  They could tell him, he’s gone no matter what, so take the money in signing bonus, get paid now, get released, they spread the cap hit out for 2 years w post June 1 designation, he gets a chance to go elsewhere if he wants or go home a rich man.

[TheFunPolice]

I feel like no matter how many years go by Star still has 4-5 years left on his deal and it's "next year" when he can be cut for any type of cap savings. 

 

 

 

 

[freddyjj]

10 minutes ago, ScottLaw said:

One of the worst contracts in Bills history….Ironic from a regime that’s been pretty good. 

Was it the contract or the fact that 2020 didn't count as a contract year given his Covid Opt out.  Not sure anyone could have foreseen that.

 

This was the year they likely saw his being released if he had played in 2020 and 2021.  OBD always likes the flexibility to walk away after Yr 1 or 2 of a re-structure.

[eball]

It wasn't a great contract to begin with, and then Covid turned it into a disaster.  Oh well.

[BarleyNY]

3 hours ago, First Round Bust said:

 

 

yeah, this would be the second requested pay-cut for Star and likely as well as for Morse. which if neither bite would likely mean the release of Morse, which is not how McBeane like to operate given no existing replacement for Morse (other than Feliciano who is likely to be cut as well)...

With Star what’s his downside for saying “no” to a pay cut?  He’s already guaranteed $2.5M.  If we cut him, then he could pocket that and sign elsewhere or just retire.  His total (new money) compensation in 2022 is $6.15M salary + $350k in per game active roster bonuses + $250k work out bonus.  $6.75M total with $2.5M of that guaranteed.  The Bills might be able to whittle down the non guaranteed $4.25M, but I don’t think it would be by much.  (Edit: To be fair, you were not suggesting that they’d get much of a reduction.)
 

Correction to my earlier post: Spotrac shows his roster bonus as per game, with nothing due in March.  Not sure if that’s an update or I just remembered it wrong.  The Bills still would want to cut him early and designate him a 6/1 cut to avoid paying him his $250k work out bonus and, in the event he was injured in team activities, his whole salary.  But they don’t have the time constraint I though they did. 

Edited February 22, 2022 by BarleyNY

[Alphadawg7]

2 hours ago, First Round Bust said:

most of us want to move on from Star, but according to Joe B (Athletic - small extract below) likely have to keep one more year...

 

 

Thats because "most of us" here don't know 1% of what our coaches know and understand about Star, his play, his value and impact on the team.  The fact people are still focused on getting rid of him while Phillips is also still a FA is even more puzzling.  

 

I am all for finding a big space eater to replace Star, given his age.  But we have been a better defense when Star is on the field.  Just getting rid of Star with no plan to replace him will degrade this teams interior defense overall.  And if it turns out we don't/can't resign Phillips, we will already need to replace him.  

 

But Star is getting up there in age, so I think there is a good chance we will draft a potential heir apparent in the first 3 rounds of the draft at DT.  

 

PS:  People need to get over him sitting out for COVID.  A lot of people chose to do that, it was their decision during a scary and unknown time.  

[Rigotz]

1 hour ago, Alphadawg7 said:

 

Thats because "most of us" here don't know 1% of what our coaches know and understand about Star, his play, his value and impact on the team.  The fact people are still focused on getting rid of him while Phillips is also still a FA is even more puzzling.  

 

Most of us understand that he opted out of 2020 completely which left us completely unprepared at 1-tech, then he skipped most of camp, then wasn't available for large parts of 2021... in addition to being severely overpaid for his production. This is a fine topic. Let's get back to it.

 

One loophole Beane might exploit w/ Star (heard this on a podcast) is that the $2.5M is guaranteed only if he attends 2022 camp. They can use this as a bargaining chip if Star wants to retire and doesn't want to go through camp -- he might be willing to negotiate on his way out and the Bills can restructure the $2.5M in a creative way to free up more 2022 cap.

[MJS]

He would have been cut this off-season, but the NFL provided him an opt-out season. That's what really is screwing the Bills.

 

It was a bad contract, but the opt-out made it worse.

 

Oh well. The Bills will survive. Maybe Star will play better next season because apparently COVID recovery really held him back. He had some highlights before he got sick.

[PetermansRedemption]

Still blows my mind that because Star opted out the Bills are stuck with the contract for an extra year. Should have been a team option to cut a year off the contract if the player opted out. 

[Thurman#1]

8 minutes ago, Rigotz said:

 

Most of us understand that he opted out of 2020 completely which left us completely unprepared at 1-tech, then he skipped most of camp, then wasn't available for large parts of 2021... in addition to being severely overpaid for his production. This is a fine topic. Let's get back to it.

 

 

 

Most of us understand that he opted out of 2020 because of Covid. That was completely understandable.

 

And he certainly didn't skip most of camp.

 

His lack of availability during the season this year is indeed a real concern, though.

 

 

 

 

[BuffaloRebound]

15 minutes ago, PetermansRedemption said:

Still blows my mind that because Star opted out the Bills are stuck with the contract for an extra year. Should have been a team option to cut a year off the contract if the player opted out. 

Agreed.  NFL should’ve created a ‘Bird exception’ like NBA has and give teams the cap space back from the opt-out.  

[Coach Tuesday]

Maybe the worst contract in franchise history, definitely the worst in Beane’s tenure.  And that’s saying something considering he paid several million dollars for two weeks of Corey Coleman.

[bigK14094]

20 minutes ago, PetermansRedemption said:

Still blows my mind that because Star opted out the Bills are stuck with the contract for an extra year. Should have been a team option to cut a year off the contract if the player opted out. 

That is the kind of thing a union negotiates...get  used to it in the NFL.  Management and players are on opposite sides of the table.