Cleveland Browns 2022 off-season thread

[The Oi]

View attachment 9982

See!

My life up to this point had actually been going really well. This made me deeply, violently depressed.

 

[Jack Brickman]

For what it's worth, people who are smarter than I am about the Browns future cap sheet are saying it's a near certainty that the Browns are going to convert Watson's 2023 base salary into a bonus for cap manipulation purposes next offseason.

Which means his 2023 base salary, which is what he'd stand to lose in the event of a delayed suspension to next season, is going to be pretty small much like his 2022 base salary.

Wouldn’t shock me to see us keep kicking that can down the road like the Saints did to keep competitive during the last stretch of Brees’ career.

 

[Ohio]

It actually is legitimately an anime, whether or not you want to accept that is up to you...

Oh, I know.

My overall point is that it is more than an anime; it is beyond that. People never even really categorized Pokemon as anime until anime became mainstream a few years ago.

 

[CBBI]

Wouldn’t shock me to see us keep kicking that can down the road like the Saints did to keep competitive during the last stretch of Brees’ career.

Jack Duffin is pretty convinced it's gonna be "convert Watson's 2023 and 2024 base salaries into bonuses" and then before the 2025 season the Browns will more or less be forced to sign Watson to a brand new massive contract extension which will kick a lot of his crazy cap hits (not in cash in hand of course) into 2026-2027-2028 and beyond.

 

[bob2the2nd]

For what it's worth, people who are smarter than I am about the Browns future cap sheet are saying it's a near certainty that the Browns are going to convert Watson's 2023 base salary into a bonus for cap manipulation purposes next offseason.

Which means his 2023 base salary, which is what he'd stand to lose in the event of a delayed suspension to next season, is going to be pretty small much like his 2022 base salary.

So I am going to start with I dont pretend to know everything when it comes to the NFL and cap space manipulation. However from what I have read that while yes the Browns can do this, It just pushes the liability onto the final couple of years. Eventually the Browns will have to pay the piper so to speak when it comes to Watson's contract as its a fully guaranteed contract

If the browns convert Watson's salary to a bonus, because its already guaranteed it acts as as basically a 2nd signing bonus (and option bonus)

So as of this moment from seasons 2023-26 Watson would have a 46 million dollar salary each year along with a 9 million dollar signing bonus hit. Meaning that each of those final 4 years Watson counts 55 million against the cap.

Now lets say the browns convert Watson's salary next year to a signing bonus. It means that for 2023 Watson would count 9 million (original signing bonus) + 46 million divided by 4 years left (12 million) for a total cap hit in 2023 of 21 million. The issue with that is it just keeps pushing off the cap damage. For the 3 years of 2024-2026 It means that Watson's cap hit balloons to 67 million dollars each year. So yeah i guess the Browns can try to keep manipulating the cap with this contract, but as I said eventually the browns are going to have to bite the bullet

 

[Randolphkeys]

Will CAR have enough room for more chips and shoulders?

Chip on shoulder? Isn't that why Baker sucked?

 

[Lee]

Bought mine for Monday night football and the day before I’m going to Steelers eagles I’m puuumped already bought my plane ticket too lol from Nc to Philly to Cleveland back to Nc

Obviously there is something wrong with me, but i just sang that line to the tune of Motown Philly. NC to Philly to Cleveland back again, doing a little football rhyme. RCF going off, not too hard, not too soft.

Yeah, i have problems.

 

[CBBI]

So I am going to start with I dont pretend to know everything when it comes to the NFL and cap space manipulation. However from what I have read that while yes the Browns can do this, It just pushes the liability onto the final couple of years. Eventually the Browns will have to pay the piper so to speak when it comes to Watson's contract as its a fully guaranteed contract

If the browns convert Watson's salary to a bonus, because its already guaranteed it acts as as basically a 2nd signing bonus (and option bonus)

So as of this moment from seasons 2023-26 Watson would have a 46 million dollar salary each year along with a 9 million dollar signing bonus hit. Meaning that each of those final 4 years Watson counts 55 million against the cap.

Now lets say the browns convert Watson's salary next year to a signing bonus. It means that for 2023 Watson would count 9 million (original signing bonus) + 46 million divided by 4 years left (12 million) for a total cap hit in 2023 of 21 million. The issue with that is it just keeps pushing off the cap damage. For the 3 years of 2024-2026 It means that Watson's cap hit balloons to 67 million dollars each year. So yeah i guess the Browns can try to keep manipulating the cap with this contract, but as I said eventually the browns are going to have to bite the bullet

Oh for sure. The Browns will inevitably have to pay the piper at some point. Fully guaranteed is fully guaranteed after all.

My assumption is that that the Browns are working under the belief that the salary cap is going to explode in the next few years and the cap will increase by bigger increments on a year-to-year basis than Watson's yearly cap hit will increase by the Browns kicking the can down the road via restructures.

A lot of people think the cap will be closer to $300M in 2025 than the $208M it is now.

I also think that after 2024 the Browns are gonna look to tack on 3-5 more years to Watson's remaining two year to push some of the insane cap hit into future years.

And by 2025 or 2026 perhaps the Browns will have cashed in a championship and no one will care anyway!

 

[Jack Brickman]

Oh for sure. The Browns will inevitably have to pay the piper at some point. Fully guaranteed is fully guaranteed after all.

My assumption is that that the Browns are working under the belief that the salary cap is going to explode in the next few years and will be closer to $300M in 2025 than the $208M it is now.

I also think that after 2024 the Browns are gonna look to tack on 3-5 more years to Watson's remaining two year to push some of the insane cap hit into future years.

And by 2025 or 2026 perhaps the Browns will have cashed in a championship and no one will care anyway!

The plan could definitely be to just eat a really shitty year or two after Watson retires and do a full rebuild then. Of course, all that assumes that he plays well for us and the team is good while he's here, and Berry will need to hit on draft picks as well for it to work.

 

[Lee]

Oh for sure. The Browns will inevitably have to pay the piper at some point. Fully guaranteed is fully guaranteed after all.

My assumption is that that the Browns are working under the belief that the salary cap is going to explode in the next few years and the cap will increase by bigger increments on a year-to-year basis than Watson's yearly cap hit will increase by the Browns kicking the can down the road via restructures.

A lot of people think the cap will be closer to $300M in 2025 than the $208M it is now.

I also think that after 2024 the Browns are gonna look to tack on 3-5 more years to Watson's remaining two year to push some of the insane cap hit into future years.

And by 2025 or 2026 perhaps the Browns will have cashed in a championship and no one will care anyway!

The Directv deal expires after this season. They have new deals in place for Thursday night deal for a Billion and the new Sunday ticket deal could generate an extra billion or more. These 2 factors alone will increase the cap by 35-40 million per a team, other revenue like other new tv deals, higher ticket prices,, ect is just making the NFL revenue increase dramatically.

 

[Lee]

My fear is i record my Browns games and usually start them half way through. In 2023 Sunday ticket is going to a streaming service, bidding is still happening. Will I lose my ability to watch the even delayed?

 

[Jack Brickman]

My fear is i record my Browns games and usually start them half way through. In 2023 Sunday ticket is going to a streaming service, bidding is still happening. Will I lose my ability to watch the even delayed?

Obviously I have no way of knowing for sure, but most streaming apps I've used in the past that have live programming on them usually have the option to start a live show from the beginning or at the point it is currently at.

 

[sailfish]

Will CAR have enough room for more chips and shoulders?

Could you imagine if they traded for Baker too? All those chips, but no salsa?!

 

[prf100]

My fear is i record my Browns games and usually start them half way through. In 2023 Sunday ticket is going to a streaming service, bidding is still happening. Will I lose my ability to watch the even delayed?

Worst case scenario, screen record off your computer (assumption here is that you can watch the stream off your computer).

 

[red.]