With the season starting, the Giants had added a little breathing room by kicking the salary-cap can down the road.
Via Field Yates of ESPN.com, the Giants have created $6.315 million in cap space by converting $8.42 million of quarterback Daniel Jones’s 2023 base salary into a signing bonus.
The Giants previously had $2.67 million in cap space, per Spotrac.com. This move puts them close to $9 million.
Some will wonder whether the Giants have an acquisition in mind. Maybe they do. Or maybe they just want to have the cap space available, in the event an opportunity arises near the trade deadline. Maybe Mike Evans will be available, to further boost an improving passing game.
Regardless, it makes sense to have the money available. The extra cap space, if not used, can be carried over to next year. That was/is/will always be Exhibit A for my belief that the 2023 Cardinals are tanking. They could have waited just a couple of days to cut receiver DeAndre Hopkins, splitting the cap charge over two years at $11 million in 2023 and $11 million in 2024. If they didn’t use the $11 million this year, it would have carried over to 2024.
Instead, they took the full $22 million dead-money charge in 2023, surrendering the opportunity to use the $11 million to potentially improve the team with an available veteran at the trade deadline. There was no reason to do it, other than to avoid being pressured by fans and media to make a move in the unlikely event they emerge as contenders. With the full $22 million absorbed now, they can say (if they somehow are in the hunt by Halloween), “Well, we’d like to make a deal, but we don’t have the cap space.”
Of course, the other side of this coin (pun not intended, because that’s what you say even if the pun is intended) is that the Cardinals could create cap space, if they want to. Just like the Giants did today. It’s easy to find a veteran deal or two, convert a large chunk of salary to signing bonus, and voila! Cap space.
With the cap always going up, it always makes sense to push current cap dollars into future years. There will be more cap dollars available then, making the relative impact of each cap dollar lower than it is now.