After hearing a little more about it and seeing an interview with Zac Taylor it seems more like a Zeke wish list than a trio of teams courting him. I will say in the right situation I think he still can help an NFL team and Philly would be a good example of a team that could benefit from him. Problem is you already have 3 comparable backs
I’m 50/50 here. I don’t know if he’s clearing cap to add to the roster or if he is clearing cap with the hopes of kicking some of the cap on the inevitable Hurts extension to the 2023 cap. I don’t know the process for doing so or the dates when conversion to this year’s cap is legal but that could be the intent here. The only thing I could see this year is taking some of the 2024 draft capital and using it for a deal for Kevin Byard from Titans with a restructure and new deal for him.
The Hurts deal is going to be part of everything they do this offseason obviously. Like I said the other day I can't imagine Howie doesn't bring in at least one biggish name/$ player. You have around $13M in cap space before this which is enough to do Hurts or add a couple of players, but not both if they are big $ guys. My guess is the Hurts extension costs about $7M-$8M against this years cap ($35M - $40M SB over 5 years). So maybe he does want to do the Hurts deal right now and get it out of the way and concurrently upgrade the roster. If you restructure Johnson you can clear up to another $10M in space. Like I said, it's just math and you can fit whatever you want against the cap within reason, but what Howie's plan is for a max he'll use this year versus rolling into next year becomes the question.
But still an elite pass protector. It's just a numbers game for you. You don't need 4 average backs
The details will come out about what and why as soon as we see them
The number I just heard is that Johnson’s cap hit is reduced by roughly 10 million with this restructure. Maybe it is both. You can grab one vet in the 6-9 million a year range and still have room to put some of Hurts extension on 2023.
I think the Eagles draft a RB this year. What remains to be seen is when they take a back. Their draft is weird. They have 4 picks in the top 100 and then nothing until the 7th round. This is why myself and others think the Eagles look to trade down for more 2023 picks from either 10 or 30.
Honestly, if Lane gets popped again for PEDs, his contract becomes voidable. He is on his last straw with that having already been caught and disciplined twice. It’s a common piece of language in a contract like this that a team would have an out if he should get booted from the league because of something like this. I don’t anticipate the Eagles being screwed there. In fact, that would be a better outcome from a cap perspective than say injury. Johnson would still have right to the guaranteed dollars and thus would still count vs the cap.
Howie can be patient. Byard doesn’t want to be there. Giving up more than a 6th or 7th round this year or a 5th in 2024 would be foolish for a player who likely forces himself out.
And the way the contract would be structured the year 1 hit will be half that. Howie would do like a 2 year $20M contract with a lot of the money in a SB or roster bonus and split over dead years. So you may have like a $3M-$4M hit year 1
If that is the case then they may have room for 2 vets in that dollar range.
