How Bucs can solve their salary cap problems, with and without Tom Brady

Even before they begin to contemplate the sobering possibility of life without Tom Brady, the Buccaneers have a tough two months ahead of them. They are $55 million above the projected $225 million salary cap for 2023, requiring a lot of maneuvering before they can re-sign the first impending free agent.

The Bucs have aggressively borrowed from the future for the past three years to help fund the present, giving Brady the best possible supporting cast to maximize their chances with him around. And that gamble paid off with a Super Bowl championship in 2020, and to a lesser extent, the first back-to-back division titles in franchise history.

That account is now due and payable.

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Forget about 24 unlimited free agents for a moment. Offensively, the story isn’t so bad: Brady had 17 starts, but the rest of the offensive free agents have 16 combined, so it’s like losing another starter. On defense, it’s significant: the free agents account for 102 starts or 54% of total defensive starts in 2022, including eight players who made eight or more starts. We’ll save most of that for another story, as this is pretty much all it takes to just get under the salary cap when the new league year starts in March, ahead of free duty.

There are very few easy cuts as most veteran contracts are already loaded with prorated bonuses that create “dead money” – room for salary cap for players not on the team. A few years ago, the Bucs were amazingly careful about this, with less than a million in dead money under their cap. They knew exactly what they were doing switching to bonuses and void years, and it’s going to make it harder this year and even next.

But here’s a humble plan to get the Bucs under wraps, knowing that more cap magic will be needed to create enough room to keep a few free agents and try to fill the voids left behind through inevitable departures. There’s a lot of math involved, so apologies in advance for that part of it.

Release four players outright

This is the most difficult part for a front office, after players who played a pivotal role in the success of the past few years. But it starts here, and we’ll suggest four cuts for cap purposes: left tackle Donovan Smith, running back Leonard Fournette, kicker Ryan Succop, and tight end Cameron Brate. The limit savings are $19.2 million – Smith saves $9.95 million, Fournette $3.5 million, Succop $3.75 million and Brate $2 million.

Smith pushed through an elbow injury that would have sidelined a lesser player, but Pro Football Focus ranked him the NFL’s No. 68 tackle, significantly down from 14th a year earlier. It won’t be easy to find a new left tackle, and the Bucs may be tempted to move Pro Bowl right tackle Tristan Wirfs to the left, but he’s done so well on the right that it maybe it’s best to leave him there and find a new tackle. replacement in the design.

Fournette has been the team’s leading rusher, but the Bucs were last in the NFL in yards per game and yards per carry, so if you’re going to do that, at least don’t pay too much for it. Brate struggled through a concussion and a scary neck injury, but only managed 174 yards to cap off a stellar nine-year run with 33 touchdowns, top-five all-time in Bucs history. Succop was wonderfully reliable in the 50, but went 2-for-7 from the 50 and beyond, and today’s kickers (well-paid ones, at least) have much more functional range.

These cuts create more holes, but it’s something of a necessary evil in this off-season.

To give Michael Evans and Chris Godwin one-year extensions

Evans is entering the final year of his contract and Godwin has two years left but they are both model citizens and reliable talents so if you keep borrowing from future years for cap relief then those are the guys you want to take it with to do.

If you give Evans $20 million for 2024, you can reduce his $15 million compensation to a minimum of $1,165,000 in the league (we’ll say $1.2 million on this one ahead) and make the rest a bonus that may be prorated for limit purposes. This frees up $8.9 million in cap space, and doing the same with Godwin (say $22 million in 2025) will free up another $14.1 million.

So there’s $23 million, or a little over $42 million to date.

Restructure deals for Vita Vea and Carlton Davis

Two of last year’s biggest contracts have high base salaries for 2023: Davis is due $14.5 million and Vea $12.5 million. A simple restructuring to minimum salary and bonus will save $10.3 million at Davis (we’re adding two blank years to help with that) and $8.8 million at Vea.

That’s another $19.1 million, so we have a total of just over $61 million in limit savings. These moves shift the limit burden to 2024, but the Bucs are much better there – just $54 million committed before our moves, 23rd out of 32 teams. Half the league already has $80 million or more on its books for 2024, when the cap should exceed $250 million.

Now, about Tom Brady

All those moves would leave the Bucs with about $6 million in cap room, enough to cover their draft picks but not much more, so they’ll need to make more moves to keep some of their best free agents.

Which brings us to Brady, and a reminder that even if you believe he’s not playing with the Bucs in 2023, there are two very different financial ramifications for him retiring or going to play elsewhere. Even when he’s done playing, the Bucs will have $35 million in dead money from reworking his past deals to create caproom. When he retires, the Bucs can process that move so that about $11 million is counted by 2023 and $24 million is shifted to 2024. That’s $24 million in new pocket money for keeping free agents and adding a few humble newcomers.

But if Brady signs with another team, the entire $35 million counts toward the 2023 cap, and there’s nothing the Bucs can do about that. It would severely limit their ability to recover their best free agents.

Bucs, Raiders, Titans, 49ers among teams interested?

If Tom Brady leaves Tampa Bay, reports have him tied to the Raiders, Titans and 49ers as he becomes a free agent. Skip Bayless and Shannon Sharpe speculate about Brady’s future.

Without going into explaining void years, we’ll just say the Bucs have another $18 million in dead money coming from non-Brady free agents if they don’t re-sign them before the new league year starts in March . Sign a new deal and some of the Void Year limit burden remains in future seasons, so you’ll have an incentive to reshoot to avoid taking a bigger hit.

Take linebacker Lavonte David, who turned 33 this week and is the Bucs’ most regular player after 11 seasons, nine of them as captain. Linebacker is not an old man’s position, and he’s coming off a deal that earned him $12.5 million a year. If he doesn’t re-sign he’ll have $6.9 million in dead money in 2023, but if they can re-sign him, it’s only $2.3 million in dead money in 2023 and $4.6 million in 2024, a short-term savings limit of $4.6 million.

So let’s say you offer David a year and $8 million — a drop off, to be sure — and you make the most of it as a bonus with an invalid year, then he ends up getting the same limit number for 2023 as if he wasn’t playing, and you’re just setting up $8 million in dead money for 2024. It kicks the can down the road.

We will suggest doing the same with defensive lineman Will Gholston. If he’s not back, he’s counting $2.4 million in dead money against the cap. But if he takes $3 million for a year, his limit this year is only $3.6 million, just $1.2 million extra. He wants to stay in Tampa, and it’s a pay cut, but one that lets him play one more year with the only team he’s ever played for.

If Brady retires, with all these moves the Bucs would have about $30 million in cap room, enough to keep one of the corners, maybe outside of linebacker Anthony Nelson and a safety and a bunch of veterans who are close to the minimum deals be in the competition. Those deals are harder to make without the allure of chasing a championship with Brady, but the Bucs will find some. It’s disheartening to see 24 unrestricted free agents, but 10 (almost half of them) started in 2022 with one game or no, so their departures could be offset with draft picks and depth gains.

And if Brady somehow wants to go back to Tampa, paying for him would complicate all of these financial decisions. But that’s something the Bucs would like to find out.

Greg Auman is FOX Sports’ NFC South reporter, covering the Buccaneers, Falcons, Panthers and Saints. He is in his 10th season for the Bucs and the NFL full-time, having spent time at the Tampa Bay Times and The Athletic. You can follow him on Twitter at @gregauman.

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