What is the Dead Money impact of players who the Giants will possibly waive/release on Final Cutdown Day?

By 6 pm ET this coming Saturday--which is only 3 days away--clubs must reduce rosters to a maximum of 53 players on the Active/Inactive List. Players who are released (this is the term used to categorize players who are cut by teams who have 4 or more years of experience), or waived (the term used for players who are cut by teams who have less than 4 years of accrued experience) may or may not have an impact on the salary cap. Those who do will affect the amount of Dead Money on a team's salary cap.

I've identified 31 players currently on the Giants' 75-man roster who are possible cuts. When I say possible, I mean a range of different probabilities ranging from unlikely to be cut all the way up to likely to be cut. Assuming injuries don't occur, players who are very unlikely--but not impossible--to be cut include guys like Terrell Thomas and Shaun Rogers, while players are very likely to be cut include guys like Bryant Browning and Marcus Harris. I included this entire range of possibilities for the purpose of simply being able to see what their potential Dead money impact would be. Most will have no Dead Money impact all on the salary cap (20 players to be exact), whereas some will have such an impact (11 of the 31 to be exact).

Out of the 11 players who do have an impact on the 2013 Dead Money total--which I estimate to be $6,873,598 right now--6 of them being possibly cut would also add on to the Dead Money total for 2014. To help provide some context, the Giants are listed as being $2,966,712 under the salary cap as of this time today (about 5:15 pm my time here in NYC) according to the NFLPA's Top 51 League Cap Report website. so every little bit will add up. This cap figure will change in 8 days to reflect the regular season salary cap accounting rules, which will include:

• all 53 players on the 53-man roster instead of just the top 51
• those who receive Injury Settlements (there should be 6 so far); if they don't settle it becomes a grievance
• player(s) on IR (only one so far in Stevie Brown)
• and those who are on the 8-man Practice Squad (which will take up $816,000 in cap space at minimum).

As can be seen, these factors will quickly cut into the remaining precious cap room that the Giants currently have. The Dead money resulting from these cuts will also be a factor. The only player who the giants let go of in their last round of cuts who put a dent into the Salary Cap via his Dead Money total, is 2013 UDFA TE Chase Clement, who they waived this past Sunday, and who is yet to be claimed (making him a candidate to be signed by the Giants to their Practice Squad in 4 days). Clement will is costing the Giants an extra $833 dollars in cap room now for this season--which already cunts under the current Top 51 Salary Cap accounting rules--& another $1,667 against the 2014 Dead money total. It will be interesting to see how much the players from this final round of cuts count. I doubt they'll count more than $100,000 in 2013. Here are the numbers for all 31 of these possible candidates to be cut below:

Based on estimate from overthecap.com with my own slight adjustments:

Giants' dead money total for 2013 (scroll to bottom)

Here are the figures for the 31 players who are candidates to be released or waived this coming Saturday, ranging from likely to unlikely, yet possible for all based on their performances and the Giants' roster situation this summer as mentioned above:

These 20 players now on the Giants' 75-man roster are Practice Squad eligible

Here is the list:

This was discussed over on BigBlueInteractive.com yesterday and the day before on a pair of threads that I started under my handle of "Optimus-NY" there. Check out the thread below for details of the discussion, and some excellent points made by posters there like "Big Blue Blogger" and "nygirlie":

List of players eligible for the Practice Squad - Part II | Optimus-NY : 8/26/2013 12:53 pm

Here's the Practice Squad Eligibility link:
Practice Squad Rules: Who’s Eligible? - by Brian McFarland | Posted on August 31, 2012


Here is the link to the CBA:
Go to Article 33, Section 4 covering Practice Squad Eligibility




Here is what Practice Squad players earn per year AT MINIMUM, as per the CBA:

The minimum salary for Practice Squad players in the NFL in 2013 is going to be $6,000 (there is no maximum). Last year and the year before it was $5,700. DE Markus White of the Bucs was the highest-paid player on any practice squad last season. He earned 3 times more than the 2012 minimum Practice Squad salary---$17,647 per week to be exact. Over the course of 17 weeks (players get paid during the bye week too), he earned $299,999.

As far as team Practice Squads rates are concerned, the Patriots had the highest paid Practice Squad in the league last year. Practice Squads count against the cap on Thursday, September 5th at 12 midnight, when the Top 51 accounting rules cease, and the regular season cap accounting rules begin. This is about 8 and a half days from now. Practice Squads, at minimum, will count $816,000 per team this year (8 players x at least $6,000 x 17 weeks).


Read this article on the subject below:

New England Patriots have top-paid NFL practice squad - By Brian McIntyre Around the League writer Published: Sept. 7, 2012 at 12:18 a.m.

This would be my 53-man roster at this point (taking the Stevie Brown injury into account)

I'm going to make my final prediction for the 53-man roster sometime on Friday, after the last preseason game in New England on Thursday night. This is a dry run for my last prediction of that final 53 (I've done it 5 times so far; call this one version 5.1, with the one on Friday being my sixth & final official guess at the 53-man roster that will be finalized by 6 pm ET on Saturday, August 31st).

Taking the Stevie Brown injury into account, as of now, these are the 53 players that I think the Giants would start the season with in Dallas:

QB (3) - Eli, Carr, & Nassib.


RB (4) - Wilson, A. Brown, Cox, & *D. Scott.


FB (1) - Hynoski


TE/H-Back (4) - Myers, Pascoe, Robinson, & Donnell.


WR (5) - Nicks, Cruz, Randle, Murphy, & Jernigan.


OL (9) - Beatty, Boothe, Baas, Snee, Pugh, Diehl, Brewer, Mosley, & Cordle.

Specialists (3) - Josh Brown at K, Weatherford at P, & DeOssie at LS.

DL (9)
*4 DEs - JPP, Tuck, Kiwi, Moore
*5 DTs - Joseph, Jenkins, Rogers, Hankins, & **Austin.

LB (6) - Paysinger, Connor, Rivers, Williams, Herzlich, & Bosworth.

S (4) - Rolle, Mundy, ***Sash, & Taylor


CB (5) - Amukamara, Webster, Hosley, Ross, & Thomas


* I think Da'Rel Scott gets waived if the Giants find a 4th RB on the waiver wire, or as a FA that they think can do more than him (which shouldn't be hard to find).

** I think Austin might be vulnerable to getting waived while Kuhn is on the PUP List. Kuhn can return to the roster between week 7 and week 10, or the Giants can IR him during that time for the entirety of the season. Absent injuries & Austin performing and progressing well in practice and in games, I'd opt to keep Kuhn on IR the whole year.

*** I think Sash is a placeholder for Will Hill, who is eligible to return from his 4-game suspension in week 5. All things being equal (no injuries at Safety or elsewhere), I think the Giants waive Sash in order to place Hill back on to the 53-man roster for week 5.




Noteable Cuts include:
QB - Curtis Painter
RB - Ryan Torrain
WR - Ramses Barden
OL - Eric Herman
DE - Adrian Tracy, Justin Trattou, Adewale Ojomo
DT - Mike Patterson
CB - Trumaine McBride




*The Dead Money in this scenario would belong to 3 players: Barden, Ojomo, and Herman.
*The total Dead Money amount would be $121,952.
*It would be spread out over 2 years.
*$79,488 would count in 2013, & $42,464 would count in 2014.

• Ramses Barden's Dead money amount of $65,000 will only count for 2013.
• Adewale Ojomo's Dead money amount will be spread out over two years:
• $500 in 2013 and
• $500 in 2014
• Eric Herman's Dead money amount would be spread out over two years:
• $13,988 in 2013 and
• $41,964 in 2014

*****

PUP List (1):

• Markus Kuhn (By all accounts he should be healthy enough to come back this year, but whether they IR him or add him to the 53-man roster depends on Austin's progress. Kuhn would be eligible to come off of the PUP List starting in week #7).
• I've got JPP starting the year on the 53-man roster even though he's on the PUP List now based on what Reese has said about him. Even if he's inactive for a game or two, he should be ok to play in the first 6 games of the season, saving the Giants salary cap space.

Injured Reserve (1):

• Sadly, this is Stevie Brown's slot. Wish him a full and speedy recovery. Hopefully, nobody else will be added to this list.

Suspension List (1):

• Will Hill is the only one who is still on the 75-man roster at this point who is suspended to start the season (4 games). WR Brandon Collins was released today, and will still have to serve his 4-game suspension to start the season, only now it won't be as a Giant. Collins is probably going to clear waivers, and then may or may not be added to the Practice Squad here or elsewhere depending on the situation at the time he is eligible to return in week 5 of the regular season.
• Hill, on the other hand, looks like he's going to be needed now, as a result of the Stevie Brown injury. He might even be the the 3rd safety when he's back. I think Sash is a placeholder for Hill until he's eligible to return, and then Sash will get waived by the team to make room for him (barring an unforeseen injury of course).

Injuries are going to play a role in this every day until final cut-down day, 6 days from now. I'll adjust my short list based on news I read from beat reporters who have full-time access to practice until the end of the preseason. After the preseason is over, they'll revert to only having part-time access (regular season rules). I'll have my final guess (6th) at the roster on Friday, August 30th either in the morning, or by the afternoon, the day after the Giants play their final preseason game against the Patriots up in Foxborough. It'll be fun to play the final roster guessing game until then.

Here is the Giants' 75-man roster after today's roster moves as it stands now w/corresponding cap numbers

Here is the list in order of largest cap number to smallest cap number with the Top 51 still listed:

Note: 
#1 - In cases where there are ties for a cap number, players are listed by in alphabetical order by their last names.

#2 - Stevie Brown isn't listed here because he is on Injured Reserve. His 2013 cap number of $2,023,000 will count against the Giants' salary cap this season though beginning September 5th.

*****

Here are players 52 through 75:

We'll be seeing moves made to trim the roster down to 53 begin to be made the day after the last preseason game is played in New England in my opinion. The deadline to reach 53 is 6 pm (New York time) on Saturday, August 31st.

Giants released 14 today; placed Stevie Brown to IR

The Giants cut the following 14 players today to reach the 75-man limit 48 hours early:

1. LB, Aaron Curry
2. FB, Ben Guidugli
3. WR, Brandon Collins (suspended for the first 4 games of the 2013 season)
4. WR, Terrence Sinkfield (2013 UDFA)
5. TE, Jamie Childers
6. TE, Chase Clement (2013 UDFA)
7. OG, Michael Jasper
8. OT, Austin Holtz (2013 UDFA)
9. MLB, Jake Muasau
10. OLB, Etienne Sabino (2013 UDFA)
11. DT, Frank Okam
12. *CB, Laron Scott (Waived/Injured)
13. CB, Junior Mertile (2013 UDFA)
14. S, Alonzo Tweedy (2013 UDFA)

There was no Dead money from any player on this list (including Aaron Curry) except for one: TE Chase Clement. As a result of waiving him today, the Giants will be responsible for an extra $833 tacked on to their Dead Money total for this year, and the remaining $1,667 on next year's salary cap. Here is his contractual breakdown, courtesy of overthecap.com:

*Note: I asked this question to Jason Fitzgerald and Joel Corry sometime back in May/June, and they explained to me how a signing bonus comes into play if you release a player after June 1st, using Clement as an example. The Giants are on the hook for this year's prorated signing bonus total of $833 with respect to Dead Money, but the remainder ($1,667) is going to be added on to next year's total.

CB Laron Scott was Waived/Injured today. The injury occurred in OT of last night's game against the Jets as per Tom Rock's tweet:

This brings the total of players who were waived/injured by the Giants this training camp/preseason to 6. They are as follows:

1. CB, Antonio Dennard
2. WR, Jeremy Horne
3. WR, Kris Adams
4. OT, Chris DeGeare
5. WR, Keith Carlos
6. CB, Laron Scott

This is significant because the Giants will have to negotiate Injury Settlements with these players' agents. This will count against the Giants' regular season salary cap when the Top 51 Rule ceases in 11 days (almost 10 now) from now on September 5th at midnight New York time. If Injury Settlements are reached, then a grievance may result, which could also effect the salary cap. After an arbitrator figures out who is at fault, a percentage of a team's salary cap would be effected (either plus or minus).

Stevie Brown will count against the cap fully this year. He had to clear waivers since he has less than 4 years of accrued experience (3 to be exact in his case) as per this tweet by Joel Corry:

His cap number of $2,023,000 (tied for 15th on the team with Andre Brown) will count FULLY against the Giants' cap this year. All players on the PUP List and Injured Reserve count against the salary cap. DE Jason Pierre-Paiul and DT Markus Kuhn are the only 2 players on the giants now who are still on the PUP List. We'll find out this week if either of them comes off of it (JPP is likely to come off of it as per the hints GM Jerry Reese has been giving in recent days).

*****

Roster Designation Lists for the Giants & how they effect the Salary Cap

Here are ten players who are spread out over four different roster designations (only four of whom are still on the roster at present) who all impact/potentially impact the Giants' salary cap in different ways this coming 2013 season that's only 12 days away from officially starting when the Ravens open up at Denver:

As indicated above, the Giants have no players on Injured Reserve at the moment. This may change of course over the span of the next week. Teams have until a week from today at 6 pm New York time to cut down their rosters from 75 to 53 players on the Active/Inactive List. Check out what they must also in addition to this from the link below regarding the August 31st final cut-down date:

Simultaneously with the cut-down to 53, clubs that have players in the categories of Active/Physically Unable to Perform or Active/Non-Football Injury or Illness must select one of the following options:

1 - Place player on Reserve/Physically Unable to Perform or Reserve/Non-Football Injury or Illness, whichever is applicable. 2 - Request waivers 3 - Terminate contract 4 - Trade contract 5 - Continue to count the player on the Active List.

Source: 2013-2014 NFL Calendar: All The Dates You Need To Know

As noted above, the players on Injured Reserve (none so far), the Waived/Injured list (five so far), and the PUP list (the Giants have 2 at the moment in JPP and Kuhn; I'll explain the difference between Inactive and Active PUP below) all count against the cap. It should be noted that the players on the Waived/Injured List will all receive Injury Settlements in all likelihood---unless things go awry between the team and the agent for any of the players in question resulting a grievance filed against the team. Injury Settlements count against a team's salary cap fully once the Top 51 Rule ceases, which will be on September 5th this year.

It should also be noted that the PUP list is divided into two different categories: Active PUP list, and the Inactive PUP list. Patricia Traina explains the difference between the two in the great article below from insidefootball.com that I recommend everyone read titled the following:

"A Review of Roster Designations & Eligibilities" - July 22, 2013

She mentions that "the reason players are placed on Active PUP as opposed to Inactive PUP during training camp is because it is easier to slide that player onto the Inactive PUP list if he's still not ready to go come September." Click on Pattie's link above for a thorough explanation of each designation of the PUP list, both Active and Inactive. As always, Patricia knows her stuff. Read the rest of the article as well for a thorough understanding of the other roster designations too.

The players on the Reserve/Suspended list (two; S Will Hill & WR Brandon Collins) only count against the Cap partially if they are placed back on the roster. They won't count against the cap while they're not on the team. If they return, the team won't be charged any cap money for the time that they were suspended (4 games in the case of each in this instance). If Hill and Collins wind up on the team again in week 5, then the Giants will only be charged 13/17ths of their cap figure for 2013. Hill's cap number for 2013 is $480,000 and Collins's is $405,000; however, only Hill has a realistic chance of winding up on the Giants' 53-man roster when he returns. Collins is most likely head to the Giants' Practice Squad---if he's lucky.

Ryan D'Imperio, who is the only player on the Giants' Reserve/Retired list does not count against the cap. Tiki Barber was on this list until the Giants, meaning they held his rights if he decided to return to the NFL, while not counting against the salary cap. TE Ben Patrick was on it as well when he suddenly decided to retire from the NFL in 2011 after the Giants signed him in free agency.

The only list that isn't included is the Non Football Injury list. This list counts against the salary cap, as do players who are on the PUP list, Injured Reserve, & the Waived/Injured List. At this point, the Giants have nobody on this list. Fans will recall Chad Jones, who suffered that horrific injury to his leg in a car accident 3 years ago, was on this list for a while after he suffered the injury.

Look out for who gets taken off or added to any of these lists in the coming week. It's very likely that JPP comes off of the PUP list, according to what Jerry Reese has said in the press over the past couple of weeks. It'll be interesting who the giants place on IR this year, if they place anyone on it at all this season. Last year, I believe they only placed 2 players on IR: Terrell Thomas and Brandon Mosley. Given the very small amount of cap space that the Giants have, they might have to restructure a contract by September 5th, when the Top 51 rules expires, in order to be able to get such a transaction under the salary cap. Keep your eyes open going forward into this coming final week of the preseason where lots of injuries tend to happen due in part to the short turnaround between preseason games this weekend and this coming Thursday when the final games of the preseason will be played.

Projected 53-man roster on opening night: ROUND 5

Here are my last 4 attempts at predicting the Giants' opening night 53-man roster in Dallas on September 8th:

• 1.) Here's my 1st projected 53-man roster for the Giants at this time, for when the Top 51 rule ceases - May 28, 2013
• 2.) Here's my 2nd attempt at predicting the Giants' 53-man roster to start the 2013 season as of today - June 29, 2013
• 3.) Here's my 3rd attempt at predicting the Giants' 53-man roster to start the 2013 season as of July 30, 2013
• 4.) Here's my 4th attempt at predicting the Giants' 53-man roster to start the 2013 season as of August 15, 2013

I was originally going to do this yesterday, but I wasn't feeling well. Here is my latest semi-educated guesstimate based not on what I would do, but what I think that the Giants will do. Without further ado, let's go ahead and unveil my fifth shot at this, only this time I'm returning an estimated salary cap number for when the Top 51 Rule expires in 13 days on September 5th:

Now here's an estimate of how the mix of players listed above all work out with respect to the Regular season cap rules:

I've got the following allocation of players per position listed here:

• The Injury Settlements are marked with a question mark because that is the one figure that I'm not able to factor into the cap equation closely. Since the Giants have 5 players who they've categorized so far this summer as being "waived/injured" (CB Antonio Dennard, WR Jeremy Horne, WR Kris Adams, OT Chris DeGeare, & WR Keith Carlos). My guess is that the settlement for each is $100,000 a piece, making the total for all 5 about $500,000. For more info on Innjury Settlements, read the articles that I linked on my August 14th blog post below:
• The Giants have 3 players listed on the waived/injured list so far this training camp

• If you subtract this $500,000 figure from the estimated $928,287 that I've got the Giants being under the cap, then you'll get about $428,287.
• This means that if any player goes on IR (which counts fully against the cap), then the Giants are in cap trouble for this season.

• Odds are that they've got some restructuring agreements with specific players (Steve Weatherford & Chris Snee are ideal candidates) in case they need more room under the cap when the Top 51 Rule ends on September 5th, which is after the 53-man roster is set.
• Keep in mind that last year the Giants had $1,000,000 in extra cap space left for emergency purposes in case they needed it, so they're close to where they were in that regard last year in this scenario.
• Last year Chris Snee helped the club to create more cap room right before the seaosn opner when he agreed to a restructuring that helped the Giants to have the cap room necessary to cover regular season operational expenses.

• Many fans are unaware that the reason that Snee's cap number is so high this year ($11 million) is because of his previous agreements to help the team get under the cap; he's done it on more than a few occasions too.
• I wouldn't be surprised if Snee helped the team out again this year, if necessary, or if Steve Weatherford did the same (the Giants could net as much as an extra $738,750 as a result of such a move).
• Check out what I wrote about the Weatheford cap help subject in this post from this past June 29th:

• Restructuring of Steve Weatherford's contract could also help the Giants make more room under the cap.

• If the Giants did a simple restructure with Weatherford's deal like they did earlier this offseason with Mathias Kiwanuka, then they could save as much as another $738,750 in cap space this year, with $246,250 being added on to Weatherford's cap number in the last three years of his deal after this season from 2014 through 2016.

• The roster spot battle that had me going back and forth was the one for the 5th DT. I had Marvin Austin making it over Mike Patterson as the 5th DT mostly due to his yet to be fully tapped potential and his draft status (2nd round pick, like Clint Sintim). They're going to give Austin every opportunity to succeed or fail based on his draft status alone. Two years is too early for them to give up on one of their highly drafted players. I had Patterson ahead of Austin for a bit, but the logic of some of the posters on this thread debating the topic sealed my decision for me:
• "Roster Talk: Patterson, Austin, Kuhn -who sticks?" | UberAlias : 9:16 am - BigBlueInteractive.com
• This post by BBI poster "Big Blue Blogger" really stood out to me in choosing Austin over Patterson:

Forget Kuhn - he's staying on PUP.

Big Blue Blogger : 9:46 am
Much was made of a throwaway comment from Coughlin that he had heard Pierre-Paul and Kuhn are getting close. Pierre-Paul will almost certainly be activated, which is the only part of the statement that should matter to anyone. Kuhn? Not even worth discussing. The only reason to activate him now would be to get a look at him in practice before cutting him. I doubt the Giants would do that, and even if they did, he's out of the Week 1 roster discussion anyway. Patterson vs. Austin is more interesting. I'm fairly sure that if the competition is close, they will keep Austin and release

Patterson. It's not just that Austin is a second-round pick who may still have upside. To me, it doesn't make good business sense to carry a vested veteran on the Week 1 roster if he's going to be a healthy scratch. I don't think the fifth DT will dress vs. Dallas, and I wouldn't want to guarantee Patterson's salary (even with a discounted cap number) when I might have to cut him soon to open a roster spot for depth at another position.

 At some point, if it looks like Austin has plateaued, they might waive him and bring Patterson back. Patterson would also be a potential mid-season replacement for an injured DT. If another team picks him up in the meantime, so be it. A guy who isn't getting a shirt for the opener can't be all that central to the team's plans.

Obviously, if Patterson is way ahead of Austin on merit, and if he figures more prominently in the rotation that I have assumed, then it's a different ballgame.

• I also think that Tyler Sash will hold onto a spot on the roster at Safety until Will Hill comes off of the Reserve/Suspended list after week 4. At that point I expect a roster exemption to be requested by the Giants, and granted giving them an extra week to make a move.
• To me Hill will take Sash's spot on the roster; it should be noted that players with less than 4 years worth of experience like Marvin Austin & Tyler Sash don't count fully against the cap for the year if they are released at any point over the course of the season. Players with more than 4 accrued years of experience do count though, which is why teams try not to make moves in-season with players that have more than 4 years of experience, so as to lessen their salary cap impact if they have to make a roster move.

• We've also seen Henry Hynoski removed from the PUP List, leaving only Jason Pierre-Paul and Markus Kuhn on it; JPP is supposedly likely going to come off of it too in the coming days. I expect Kuhn to start the year this list, and be eligible to come back between week 7 and week 10. It's then that Marvin Austin could be vulnerable again if he doesn't show anything until that point to the Giants' coaching staff and front office.
• I expect to see about 5 roster spots decided over the course of the coming week, in which there will be the Giants' last 2 preseason games and final 2 practices before they begin to prepare for the Cowboys on Opening Night in Dallas on September 8th.
• My sixth & final official guess at the 53-man roster will be a week from today, the night after the Giants' 4th and final preseason game in New England. Keep an eye out for injuries and JPP's PUP list situation potentially changing between now and then.

• Some notable & semi-notable cuts from the list above include the following:
• QB - Curtis Painter
• RB - Ryan Torain
• TE - Larry Donnell
• WR - Ramses Barden
• OL - 2013 7th round pick OG Eric Herman
• DL - DT Mike Patterson, DE Adrian Tracy, & DE Justin Trattou
• LB - Kyle Bosworth
• *S - I think Tyler Sash makes the final 53 for now, but once Will Hill is eligible to return from his 4-game suspension he may very well be released.
• CB - Trumaine McBride

• I think that the Practice Squad will include these 8 players from the roster from the 29 who are eligible on the roster (click HERE to read that list), unless they nab players from other teams. Here's an educated guess at those make it (same as last time):

• The two players on the Reserve/Suspended list above interesting to keep note of, as the are going to come off that list at the same time (right after week 4). I think Hill returns to the roster in place of Sash, while Collins is a candidate to go on the Practice Squad.
• Remember that in 2013, the rate that Practice Squad players earn per week is $6,000 (at minimum) over the course of 17 weeks.
• This total of $102,000 per player x 8 players = $816,000
• Keep in mind though that teams can pay players more than this if they choose to do so.
• I'll be happy when my guesses are all over next week at this time because it's gotten a little crazy trying to keep up with the numbers and player news. Almost there.