08-21-2025, 09:52 AM
(08-21-2025, 08:57 AM)Bengalbug Wrote: Honestly, the bengals FO does a pretty good job when you look at the team globally. I do wish they would “push their chips in” from time to time.
The saints have 88,000,000 in dead money this year, 60,000,000 in dead money next year. They haven’t been to the playoffs since 2020.
I say this as the manipulating salary cap is a slippery slope. Yes the saints won a Super Bowl, so likely worth it… but the bad cap management came well after that Super Bowl.
The Saints problem is they never wanted to take their medicine, but also never drafted well enough to be able to avoid taking their medicine.
Other teams that manipulated the cap for runs either had that 1-3 bad year stretch (the medicine) after to reset their cap situation, or they drafted incredibly well and with all that young cheap talent were able to reset after 1 down year (Rams after '21, Pederson Eagles).
The Saints ownership or FO just refuses to have a couple of bad seasons where they just don't spend and instead suck. But they also don't draft well enough to avoid having to do that in order to stop having to kick the can endlessly.
Using the Saints as a "cautionary tale" for why you shouldn't manipulate the salary cap is the current day version of "you shouldn't sign big FAs because look at the DC with Haynesworth".
Some of the biggest manipulators of the cap? Eagles, Rams, Chiefs, the Bucs (with Brady). The last 6 straight SB winners.
The Bucs had $81.5m in dead cap in 2023 and $62.5m in dead cap in 2024 (but were able to stay semi-relevant because the NFCS is a garbage heap)... but they did it because they took 3 of their best shots at winning a SB with Brady, and did end up winning one.
(08-21-2025, 09:00 AM)SunsetBengal Wrote: Another example of a team going "all in" to win is the LA Rams. It worked out for them in 2021, and they suffered two disappointing seasons as a result of cap issues. Now, they are fully reloaded and back in contention.
Rams really only had the one bad year in '22. In '23 they won 10 games and were 1-and-done in the playoffs, which is disappointing as far as SBs go but still better than we've done the last two years and we didn't have any backlash or debt from going all-in.
The Eagles went all-in, won a Super Bowl ('17), tailed off, fired their coach, got rid of the QB, rebuilt, had one terrible year, and then proceeded to go all-in again to two more SBs ('22 and '24), winning another one.
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