Bills Cap Mismanagement

[stuvian]

Good topic. We nickled and dimed Andy Levitre and Jason Peters but paid a king's ransom for Mario Williams. These moves are on Buddy Nix IMO. We have invested salary cap dollars with a losers mentality - we must overpay to keep players because we are small market.

[Augie]

I'm generally a Whaley supporter, but cap management is my biggest issue. We can do better there, I think.

[Rob's House]

Drafting has been halfway decent as far as selecting talented players. The draft problem has been 3 fold: wasting picks to trade up, switching coaches with drastically different schemes (poor fits for previously drafted players), and poor QB scouting.

 

Who's to blame? Hard to say. Normally I'd blame the GM. Perhaps that's appropriate here. But the bizarre Whaley press conferences makes me wonder if he's really a GM in the traditional sense or if he's just a glorified scout.

 

Whoever is to blame, the approach has been short sighted in recent years. There's a lot to be said for continuity. If things are going in the wrong direction maybe it's better to pull the plug sooner rather than later, but unless you're willing to commit to a philosophy for 3-5 years you're either hoping for a lucky break or you're just spinning your wheels.

[Steve Billieve]

 

 

1. QB/LT/WR1

2. RT/C/G/WR2/TE

3. HB/FB/WR3

 

1. Pass rushers/CB/DL

2. none

3. S/LB

 

 

Seems like the bills are pretty much agreeing with you here with maybe the exception of rb/fb. It's hard to deny that we've gotten good value out of our running backs. When we signed Felton he was touted as the best in the biz at what he did, so it was probably a miss but we've had much worse cap mistakes.

[Gunsgoodtime]

The Bills cap has been mismanaged for a long time. While I think this organization has been great in some areas this area has been pretty awful.

Good teams identify key positions to invest their cap dollars. There are exceptions to this if you have a top 5 player at a lesser position, perhaps you pay him.

Certainly up for debate but I'll take a stab at identifying which positions should be paid for and which shouldn't (1 pay, possibly pay, 3 dont pay):

1. QB/LT/WR1

2. RT/C/G/WR2/TE

3. HB/FB/WR3

1. Pass rushers/CB/DL

2. none

3. S/LB

 

Some pretty questionable signings in the last few years under Whaley at positions where you need to find cheap alternatives:

 

Graham - $6 mil for below average.

 

AWill - $6 mil per for 1 good year. They lose Byrd (correct move letting him walk) and then overpay an unproven guy on a long term deal.

 

McCoy - why did they give him a new deal? because he whined he wouldn't play? Retire then dude, you don't have a lot of options. We traded for a 2 year deal with no dead cap component. The new deal creates the potential for a bunch of dead cap. He's 29, the cliff isn't far off.

 

The Pats paid the most to a RB in many years for Burkehead at a measily $3.15 mil. We've dumped countless 1st rounders and large contracts into the RB position. Mike G looked pretty good last year, maybe it's more about the line than the RB.

 

Clay - $9 mil, top 8 salary at TE for a guy who had some potential but hadn't done much. Rex was so driven to screw the Dolphins he screwed the Bills instead.

 

Felton - $3 mil for a fullback? The position is dying, lots of them out there. Grab one on the cheap.

 

Easley - you can't pay a 6th WR special team player who's not a returner anything but the minimum.

Glenn and Dareus deserve big contracts, but the cap numbers are crazy and growing by the year. 14 and 16 mil per. Dareus' off-field issues should have resulted in a significant discount.

 

Gilmore's gone as a result of some of these bad signings. It seems there's a disconnect between the personnel dept. and the cap/finance dept.

 

It's not fair to only point out the bad.

Getting Tyrod to renogotiate when there was little reason to was a big win. But why did they set the contract up that way in the first place?

 

Past deals to Hughes and Incognito both seem pretty reasonable

The LoRax, Hyde, Groy, Holmes deals all seem pretty solid.

But who's Poyer and what's he done to earn $2.5 mil?

 

I'm interested to hear what others think the prime positions are and what are the best and worst signings the Bills have made.

I'm with you on the Poyer signing, that one is a head scratcher to me, the estimate by the professionals was like 1.25m per year. Feel like we over paid on that one. Dareus is a terrible deal based off of his own doings...he needs to correct that now or its a crippling deal. The Tyrod contract is a great deal, but don't make up for the bad ones we have. Btw, 2 1st and a 4th on sammy is looking really bad right now considering his injuries. Hope they all prove me wrong

O

Edited April 1, 2017 by Gunsgoodtime

[johnnywo]

 

The Bills cap has been mismanaged for a long time. While I think this organization has been great in some areas this area has been pretty awful.

 

Good teams identify key positions to invest their cap dollars. There are exceptions to this if you have a top 5 player at a lesser position, perhaps you pay him.

 

Certainly up for debate but I'll take a stab at identifying which positions should be paid for and which shouldn't (1 pay, possibly pay, 3 dont pay):

 

1. QB/LT/WR1

2. RT/C/G/WR2/TE

3. HB/FB/WR3

 

1. Pass rushers/CB/DL

2. none

3. S/LB

 

Some pretty questionable signings in the last few years under Whaley at positions where you need to find cheap alternatives:

Graham - $6 mil for below average.

AWill - $6 mil per for 1 good year. They lose Byrd (correct move letting him walk) and then overpay an unproven guy on a long term deal.

McCoy - why did they give him a new deal? because he whined he wouldn't play? Retire then dude, you don't have a lot of options. We traded for a 2 year deal with no dead cap component. The new deal creates the potential for a bunch of dead cap. He's 29, the cliff isn't far off.

The Pats paid the most to a RB in many years for Burkehead at a measily $3.15 mil. We've dumped countless 1st rounders and large contracts into the RB position. Mike G looked pretty good last year, maybe it's more about the line than the RB.

Clay - $9 mil, top 8 salary at TE for a guy who had some potential but hadn't done much. Rex was so driven to screw the Dolphins he screwed the Bills instead.

Felton - $3 mil for a fullback? The position is dying, lots of them out there. Grab one on the cheap.

Easley - you can't pay a 6th WR special team player who's not a returner anything but the minimum.

 

Glenn and Dareus deserve big contracts, but the cap numbers are crazy and growing by the year. 14 and 16 mil per. Dareus' off-field issues should have resulted in a significant discount.

Gilmore's gone as a result of some of these bad signings. It seems there's a disconnect between the personnel dept. and the cap/finance dept.

It's not fair to only point out the bad.

 

Getting Tyrod to renogotiate when there was little reason to was a big win. But why did they set the contract up that way in the first place?

Past deals to Hughes and Incognito both seem pretty reasonable

 

The LoRax, Hyde, Groy, Holmes deals all seem pretty solid.

 

But who's Poyer and what's he done to earn $2.5 mil?

I'm interested to hear what others think the prime positions are and what are the best and worst signings the Bills have made.

 

I'd be worried if they didn't have $44M+ next season....none of my business though..

 

http://overthecap.com/salary-cap/buffalo-bills/

[John from Riverside]

I'd be worried if they didn't have $44M+ next season....none of my business though..

 

http://overthecap.com/salary-cap/buffalo-bills/

What I find interesting is they have done virtually NO restructures this year to give themselves more cap room....intead working within the perameters of the cap that they actually had and redoing TT's contract.

 

They have done no kicking the can down the road and yet have still found some talented guys.

[PromoTheRobot]

Good topic. We nickled and dimed Andy Levitre and Jason Peters but paid a king's ransom for Mario Williams. These moves are on Buddy Nix IMO. We have invested salary cap dollars with a losers mentality - we must overpay to keep players because we are small market.

The people you don't sign are always nickel and dimed and the people you do sign were overpaid.

[Kirby Jackson]

I'm not sure how anyone that understands can think that the cap has been mismanaged? When was the last player that the Bills couldn't afford to pay? (I am waiting for someone to say Gilmore and show their clear lack of understanding of the cap). Maybe Nate Clements? London Fletcher? The Bills cap has been managed EXTREMELY well. If you don't like certain players that's different than cap mismanagement.

[JohnC]

I'm not sure how anyone that understands can think that the cap has been mismanaged? When was the last player that the Bills couldn't afford to pay? (I am waiting for someone to say Gilmore and show their clear lack of understanding of the cap). Maybe Nate Clements? London Fletcher? The Bills cap has been managed EXTREMELY well. If you don't like certain players that's different than cap mismanagement.

I agree with you that it is unfair to conclude that our cap has been mismanaged. But that is not to say that it has been efficiently run compared to other organizations. A simple definition of a cap system is reduced to the core of talent vs cost. Some organizations have a better grasp on that relationship than others.

 

New England is the model for managing a cap. They have maintained the highest level of success while tightly managing the costs. Players come and go as much and as fast as any other franchise in the league. The key to their success is having the replacements ready or near hand when the inevitable departures happen.

 

Ultimately success is measured based on a team's record. By that measurement the Bills are a failure. Managing the cap well or poorly in and of itself tells you little. During the Ralph Wilson era under the direction of Littman the Bills were a tightly cap managed team.

 

There is a number of acceptable ways of configuring a team's cap. There is no one template other than maybe what New England does. The bottom line is it comes down to talent and how it is distributed within a roster. Based on Buffalo's accumulated record W/L and the money the organization has spent this team has not very impressively managed its cap.

 

The essence of cap management is talent assessment and placing a value to it. The problem with the Bills is that they have not done well with the talent assessment side of the equation. Both sides are inextricably linked. If you too often miss on the talent side then you will inevitably fail on the cap/financial side. The record determines the ultimate judgment.

[Manther]

What I find interesting is they have done virtually NO restructures this year to give themselves more cap room....intead working within the perameters of the cap that they actually had and redoing TT's contract.

 

They have done no kicking the can down the road and yet have still found some talented guys.

Agreed, which I think is a good thing. If they wanted or needed to kick the can down the road they could have. So, I think that is promising that we have options and flexibiltiy to kick it and secondly, that we didn't and will be in a great cap situation moving forward.

 

Once again, I think they have a plan and are sticking to it.

[Manther]

I'm not sure how anyone that understands can think that the cap has been mismanaged? When was the last player that the Bills couldn't afford to pay? (I am waiting for someone to say Gilmore and show their clear lack of understanding of the cap). Maybe Nate Clements? London Fletcher? The Bills cap has been managed EXTREMELY well. If you don't like certain players that's different than cap mismanagement.

Agreed. We didn't lose Gilmore because we didn't want to pay him. We lost him because we didn't deem him worth that alotmnet of the cap. Either because where we valued the position, valued Gilmore and where we valued Gilmore vs the position.

 

I think the only two times in recent years we could say we mismanged the cap was the offering of the contracts to Byrd and Spiller. But, we don't know exactly what those contracts were. I don't think anyone knows what we really offered Byrd. But, what we do know is we valued Aaron Williams at $6.25/M a year. So, I would say we did a great job and there was a freak injury.

 

So, the only cap mismangement I can think of IMO is $4/M year for Spiller that he didn't take. That would have been a waste of cap space and roster spot.

 

Overall, great track record for the last 5 years approx!

 

Right or wrong, the signings of Dareus (I would have liked clauses and would always when some has a previous suspension) being DL, Jerry Hughes as pass rusher and Cordy Glenn at LT are all going rate or less. The good thing IMO is the Bills are valuing the correct positions to pay the money and then still looking to get a cap friendly deal done. Jerry and Cordy are cap friendly at good positions.

[OldTimeAFLGuy]

Agreed, which I think is a good thing. If they wanted or needed to kick the can down the road they could have. So, I think that is promising that we have options and flexibiltiy to kick it and secondly, that we didn't and will be in a great cap situation moving forward.

 

Once again, I think they have a plan and are sticking to it.

...then again, there could be restructuring discussions/negotiations going on right now behind the scenes....IMO, two candidates would be Eric Wood (due $7.583 mil in 2017) and Kyle Williams (due $8.3 mil in 2017).....spread both over 2 years for some pretty good savings (I think).........they're not going anywhere at this point in their careers.........

[Dragonborn10]

Just give one example of any player let go or not signed due to salary cap restrictions? It hasn't happened. They paid Fitz like he was a franchise QB. They paid Mario Williams a pass rusher elite money. They have a LT earning top dollar. Their WR #1 is on a rookie deal. Outside of running back and paying a gunner (Easely) more than the minimum I'm not sure there is one even questionable decision/contract. As for Dareus, if he hit FA 30 other teams would have gladly paid him the same or more. Again these decisions in no way impacted their ability to sign, release, or let walk any player.

Want to complain about wasted resources and cap mismanagement. Don't trade away draft picks. Don't move up in the draft. Move down and acquire more picks. That is how you stay young and under the cap. Add cheap talent through the draft and pick and choose what players to keep.

[Augie]

I guess I'm influenced by the list of who has cap space each off season, where we had so much less to spend on FA's. I'd like to be able to do a little more shopping to fill some holes (esp. RT), but I really don't even know who to target. It would have been nice to keeps Woods, but I'm not sure if that was good value, so... With that said (or admitted?), I AM glad that we are NOT "kicking the can down the road".

[OldTimeAFLGuy]

Good topic. We nickled and dimed Andy Levitre and Jason Peters but paid a king's ransom for Mario Williams. These moves are on Buddy Nix IMO. We have invested salary cap dollars with a losers mentality - we must overpay to keep players because we are small market.

...if I remember correctly, Andy was looking for and got $8 mil/yr which posters said was absurd money for a guard......and he did not do much after cashing in, so why would you term it "nickle and diming"?..

[stuvian]

...if I remember correctly, Andy was looking for and got $8 mil/yr which posters said was absurd money for a guard......and he did not do much after cashing in, so why would you term it "nickle and diming"?..

he played all 16 games for the NFC champ Falcons. We were told his knees were shot which was apparently BS

[Augie]

he played all 16 games for the NFC champ Falcons. We were told his knees were shot which was apparently BS

Like the Cheaters, better teams make guys look like better players.

[DanInUticaTampa]

 

The Bills cap has been mismanaged for a long time. While I think this organization has been great in some areas this area has been pretty awful.

 

Good teams identify key positions to invest their cap dollars. There are exceptions to this if you have a top 5 player at a lesser position, perhaps you pay him.

 

Certainly up for debate but I'll take a stab at identifying which positions should be paid for and which shouldn't (1 pay, possibly pay, 3 dont pay):

 

1. QB/LT/WR1

2. RT/C/G/WR2/TE

3. HB/FB/WR3

 

1. Pass rushers/CB/DL

2. none

3. S/LB

 

Some pretty questionable signings in the last few years under Whaley at positions where you need to find cheap alternatives:

Graham - $6 mil for below average.

AWill - $6 mil per for 1 good year. They lose Byrd (correct move letting him walk) and then overpay an unproven guy on a long term deal.

McCoy - why did they give him a new deal? because he whined he wouldn't play? Retire then dude, you don't have a lot of options. We traded for a 2 year deal with no dead cap component. The new deal creates the potential for a bunch of dead cap. He's 29, the cliff isn't far off.

The Pats paid the most to a RB in many years for Burkehead at a measily $3.15 mil. We've dumped countless 1st rounders and large contracts into the RB position. Mike G looked pretty good last year, maybe it's more about the line than the RB.

Clay - $9 mil, top 8 salary at TE for a guy who had some potential but hadn't done much. Rex was so driven to screw the Dolphins he screwed the Bills instead.

Felton - $3 mil for a fullback? The position is dying, lots of them out there. Grab one on the cheap.

Easley - you can't pay a 6th WR special team player who's not a returner anything but the minimum.

 

Glenn and Dareus deserve big contracts, but the cap numbers are crazy and growing by the year. 14 and 16 mil per. Dareus' off-field issues should have resulted in a significant discount.

Gilmore's gone as a result of some of these bad signings. It seems there's a disconnect between the personnel dept. and the cap/finance dept.

It's not fair to only point out the bad.

 

Getting Tyrod to renogotiate when there was little reason to was a big win. But why did they set the contract up that way in the first place?

Past deals to Hughes and Incognito both seem pretty reasonable

 

The LoRax, Hyde, Groy, Holmes deals all seem pretty solid.

 

But who's Poyer and what's he done to earn $2.5 mil?

I'm interested to hear what others think the prime positions are and what are the best and worst signings the Bills have made.

 

 

The only one of those that seems bad or a bust contract is the Clay one. All the other contracts have at least an argument as to why it was worth it. I don't think Gilmore was worth the contract the pats gave him. and Mccoy is special, and he is our star on offense. Patriots don't need to invest in the RB position because they have probably the best QB in history playing for them. I see nothing wrong with the contract we gave mccoy, he carries our offense and he has been worth every penny.

 

Whaley's failures have been not getting a franchise QB and making a questionable trade up for sammy watkins. Overall I consider him an average GM. but he made some mistakes early on and it looks like this will be his last season barring a miracle of us getting into the playoffs

[Kirby Jackson]

I agree with you that it is unfair to conclude that our cap has been mismanaged. But that is not to say that it has been efficiently run compared to other organizations. A simple definition of a cap system is reduced to the core of talent vs cost. Some organizations have a better grasp on that relationship than others.

 

New England is the model for managing a cap. They have maintained the highest level of success while tightly managing the costs. Players come and go as much and as fast as any other franchise in the league. The key to their success is having the replacements ready or near hand when the inevitable departures happen.

 

Ultimately success is measured based on a team's record. By that measurement the Bills are a failure. Managing the cap well or poorly in and of itself tells you little. During the Ralph Wilson era under the direction of Littman the Bills were a tightly cap managed team.

 

There is a number of acceptable ways of configuring a team's cap. There is no one template other than maybe what New England does. The bottom line is it comes down to talent and how it is distributed within a roster. Based on Buffalo's accumulated record W/L and the money the organization has spent this team has not very impressively managed its cap.

 

The essence of cap management is talent assessment and placing a value to it. The problem with the Bills is that they have not done well with the talent assessment side of the equation. Both sides are inextricably linked. If you too often miss on the talent side then you will inevitably fail on the cap/financial side. The record determines the ultimate judgment.

Bad signings and cap mismanagement are totally different. I agree that the talent side is a part of it. Corey Graham shouldn't have had the cap number that he did. My point was that the Bills have not had to let a player walk in a decade. They have made some business decisions along the way but they haven't been forced to make a decision because they couldn't afford it in a decade. You can criticize the Bills for plenty but "cap management" isn't one of them. They have a restructure for Glenn and Dareus sitting in their back pocket if they need it.

Agreed. We didn't lose Gilmore because we didn't want to pay him. We lost him because we didn't deem him worth that alotmnet of the cap. Either because where we valued the position, valued Gilmore and where we valued Gilmore vs the position.

 

I think the only two times in recent years we could say we mismanged the cap was the offering of the contracts to Byrd and Spiller. But, we don't know exactly what those contracts were. I don't think anyone knows what we really offered Byrd. But, what we do know is we valued Aaron Williams at $6.25/M a year. So, I would say we did a great job and there was a freak injury.

 

So, the only cap mismangement I can think of IMO is $4/M year for Spiller that he didn't take. That would have been a waste of cap space and roster spot.

 

Overall, great track record for the last 5 years approx!

 

Right or wrong, the signings of Dareus (I would have liked clauses and would always when some has a previous suspension) being DL, Jerry Hughes as pass rusher and Cordy Glenn at LT are all going rate or less. The good thing IMO is the Bills are valuing the correct positions to pay the money and then still looking to get a cap friendly deal done. Jerry and Cordy are cap friendly at good positions.

That's where I'm at Manther. The Bills don't even have a little bit of a salary cap issue. They have the numbers all figured out.