As the new league year creeps closer and closer, all teams are bracing for final word as to the team-by-team cap limit for 2024.
The process isn’t as easy as it seems. Every year, the league and the NFL Players Association negotiate the number, with various factors coming into play. In the past, it has been higher than perhaps it should have been; the year after the lockout, for example, it was believed that the league agreed to ensure that the cap would not fall in comparison to 2011, in order to avoid a mutiny within the union.
Currently, there’s a thought that the league wants to avoid a massive spike in the cap, opting instead for a “smoothing” of the cap limit as TV deals and gambling money increase and the losses from the pandemic slip from the books.
For now, multiple sources have indicated that the teams expect the 2024 cap to be in the neighborhood of $242 million and $243 million. Another source, in response to that number, had this reaction: “More.”
Whatever it is, it’s a far cry from the initial cap, back in 1994, of $34.6 million.
The final number will likely emerge next week, after final negotiations at the Scouting Combine. Whatever the figure, keep that amount in mind when reacting to the contracts players will receive (and that they deserve). Also remember that, generally speaking, the $243 million or so per team that will go to the players is matched by $245 million or so per team that goes to the owners.
UPDATE 1:47 p.m. ET: Another source, with a proven record of accuracy in these matters, says it will be closer to $250 million than to $243 million.