Miami Dolphins

Dolphins to 'certainly' consider restructuring Suh's contract

Published Jan. 27, 2016 9:52 a.m. ET

Cameron DaSilva

The Miami Dolphins made the biggest splash in free agency last offseason, signing Ndamukong Suh to the largest contract for a defensive player in NFL history. One year later and the cost of the contract is already weighing heavy on the Dolphins' salary cap situation.

According to Spotrac.com, Suh's cap hit in 2016 will be $28.6 million -- or 18.57 percent of the team's salary cap. Obviously that's a massive number, and the Dolphins would like to get it down a bit.

Mike Tannenbaum, executive vice president of football operations, said on Tuesday that the Dolphins will look at restructuring his deal.

Via the Sun-Sentinel:

“That’s certainly one of the levers we’re going to take a close look at,” Tannenbaum said. “We haven’t made any decisions as it relates to strategic planning or salary cap, budget, things like that. We have designed, and I think [executive vice president of football administration] Dawn [Aponte] has done a really good job when these contracts were constructing, that we have a lot of flexibility.By the time we get to the first day of the league year, we should have plenty of room to address the needs that we have, and certainly we’ll be looking at Suh’s contract.”

Restructuring won't take care of the issue completely, of course. It will make his cap hit smaller this season, but it will increase it down the road in later seasons. That's what comes with signing a player to a six-year, $114 million deal.

It won't be easy for the Dolphins to meander around his contract in the coming years given the size and cost of it, but they'll seemingly begin to chip away at it this offseason.