Sunday, July 21, 2013

Justin Pugh & Ryan Nassib are probably going to sign on the first day of training camp, as per Patricia Traina

The always informative and tapped in Patricia Traina of insidefootball.com has been on the money regarding the Giants this offseason (check out here website linked above). She was spot on about the new Cruz deal, when she suggested that it might actually lower the Giants' cap number in 2013--it did so by giving the Giants an additional $349,000 in cap room. If she says something contract related, I listen, and recommend that others do the same. I tweeted the following two days ago, & got this response Patricia:





































This is something that Giants fans have wondered about in recent days. With training camp starting 5 days from today on July 26th, speculation had begun among some fans regarding when this would get done. I tweeted yesterday that 231 of 254 2013 draftees had signed contracts with their respective teams--that's approximately 91%. of the players selected almost 3 months ago in this year's draft. Two of the remaining 23 are Giants: Pugh and Nassib. This might frustrate Giants fans when factoring in the slotted nature of signing draft picks now (for the most part--offset language aside).


The issues with unsigned first round pick Justin Pugh (OT/OG out of Syracuse), & unsigned fourth rounder Ryan Nassib (QB also out of Syracuse) are as follows:

  • 4th year guaranteed money is the issue at hand for Justin Pugh (chosen 19th overall), which all of the picks who were chosen 14th through 21st received, as pointed out in this article by Mike Florio from PFT:
  • Jason Fitzgerald wrote a great article about this subject back on May 10th on his website, overthecap.com:
  • It looks like this is just the agent waiting to see if the Giant will blink, but as Patricia states in the tweet posted above, it doesn't look like the Giants will budge on either front (Pugh's or Nassib's).
  • Nassib's situation is simpler, with it being about salary splits.
  • Nassib, chosen 110th overall, is fighting for only one year of salary splits (2013 only), with the Giants fighting for two (2013 and 2014), as stated in Jason's superior article above.

Once Pugh signs his projected cap number will decrease the Giants' current cap number of $3,657,682 by $961,436, resulting in a new cap number of $2,696,246. Pugh's projected cap number for 2013 is going to be $1,517,436 while Nassib's is going to be $518,400. This is as per Jason Fitzgerald's pick-by-pick 2013 NFL Salary Cap estimates on overthecap.com, and Joel Corry. Here's what he tweeted me two days ago:




















The Pugh cap number would be in the Giants' top 51 list of cap numbers. Salary displacement of the 51st cap number, belonging to Spencer Paysinger ($556,000), would take place. Paysinger would no longer count against the cap, but the difference between his cap number and Pugh's--listed above as being $961,436--would factor in. This is how the new cap number of $2,696,246 was determined (I subtracted $961,436 from the Giants' current team cap number of $3,657,682 listed above).

Nassib's cap number, on the other hand, will not factor into the Giants' cap until the top 51 rule ceases at midnight NY time on Thursday, September 5th. He's a shoe-in to make the team (pending a crazy injury or an act of God). This is why his contract won't count yet against the Giants' cap. Check out the remainder of the tweet above regarding this situation:

























Nassib's value to this team FAR exceeds his salary though when you look at what he can provide this team with going forward besides just being an adequate backup to Eli in 2014 (he's not ready yet in 2013, which is why the Giants will carry 3 QBs this year, and then let David Carr walk, ceding the primary backup QB position to Nassib next year). He can function as trade bait in 3 years if Eli is still going strong, provided that he's shown enough to possibly be a starter in the league. Look at the Rob Johnson trade for reference in the late 90s with the Coughlin led Jags. Nassib can also function as insurance against Eli in case his salary demands get crazy (which they won't), and most importantly possibly be Eli's successor.

Of these 3 scenarios, the first one is what people and the Giants' management would like to see be the most prominent. that would mean Eli will still be going strong 3 years from now, and that Nassib has shown enough to warrant being traded elsewhere in exchange for a high pick--while not taking many if any snaps under Center as the Giants' starting QB. This is why the preseason will important to him. It will allow him to showcase his stuff, as many young backup QBs have done in the past on their way to being traded elsewhere. The odds of Eli going down for an extended period of time in the regular season increase as he gets older (he'll be 33 on January 3rd of 2014). It's nice to have a young gun in the bullpen in case things go sideways--even if the odds of them doing so are still relatively low when you consider how exceedingly durable Eli and his brother have been for the larger parts of their careers.

In summary, at this time next week, we should expect to see the Giants be $2,696,246 under the cap after Pugh and Nassib sign on the first day of training camp on July 26th---a difference of $961,436 from their current number of $3,657,682. After that, I wouldn't be surprised to see a small restructure take place with Steve Weatherford's contract that would give the Giants an additional $738,750 in cap space (raising his cap number by $246,250 though from 2014 to 2016), raising the total cap space number listed above back to what it is close to being now, but that's a topic for another post.

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