Capologist can't see Chiefs keeping Eric Berry 'from getting paid this year'
KANSAS CITY, Mo. -- John Dorsey sheds players, you shed wardrobe. It's spring-cleaning season, and your sauce-stained Dwayne Bowe jersey, the one that smells like fine brisket and spilled beer, is polyester toast.
But Kansas City Chiefs fans shouldn't have to toss their Derrick Johnson or Chase Daniel replicas into the ol' GARAGE SALE box just yet.
We think.
We hope.
"By releasing players like (Dwayne) Bowe, the Chiefs should be in better cap shape moving forward, so deferring some money to 2016 should not have a really bad impact on the team," explains Jason Fitzgerald, your friendly neighborhood capologist and one of the wunderkinds behind the OverTheCap.com website. "They will need to rework contracts to sign their rookies and function during the regular season, but I think they have already cut whomever they needed to cut. This will simply be (about) pushing money to next year unless they can agree on a deal with (Justin) Houston."
Oh, right. That.
The impasse between the franchise and its best defender -- the Chiefs, as expected, tagged their all-time single-season sack leader last month, much to Houston's alleged chagrin -- is in the infancy of what could be a long and occasionally rocky process.
In the meantime, of course, there are rookies to draft, starting April 30. OverTheCap estimates the Chiefs toting a total rookie salary pool of $6.365 million to work with for 10 picks, assuming all 10 picks are kept. The "real" cost, once a drafted player pushes one of the current top 51 salaries off the Chiefs' current cap count, is estimated at $2.015 million.
Since Fitzgerald and his posse also peg the Chiefs' current cap number at $2.416 million -- second lowest in the league to the Saints' $302,372 -- means that, while the new class should fit, it'll be a tight one, with less than $500,000 left in projected room post-draft.
Which, of course, raises a few niggles. Namely:
1. If you're Dorsey, the Chiefs' general manager, what do you do THEN?
2. And what does any of this mean for the future of Pro Bowl safety Eric Berry, who's scheduled to take up $8.357 million in cap room this fall but may not play a down as he recovers from Hodgkin's lymphoma?
"I'd look into getting cap relief with Berry by doing something similar to what the team just did with Tamba Hali," Fitzgerald offers. "Add four additional void years to Berry's contract and convert most of his base salary ($5.155 million) to a bonus.
"They can save around $3 million by doing that and deferring it to 2016, when they have more cap flexibility (and an estimated $58.476 million in room)."
Berry finished the 2014 season on the NFL's non-injury list (or NFI). If he spends the 2015 season there, the franchise isn't obligated to pay him, although it did so throughout the previous campaign.
And probably will continue to do so, although possibly at a restructured, mutually agreed-upon rate. Common sense says the heart (and conscience) will prevail here -- especially as the public relations blowback from not paying Berry, one of the most popular Chiefs representatives inside and outside the locker room, would hardly be worth the bookkeeping cushion.
"I can't picture the Chiefs doing something that would prevent Berry from getting paid this year," Fitzgerald counters. "It's their right to put him on the NFI list and then hold his contract into 2016, but the backlash inside and outside the locker room would be huge.
"I think they would do something like I mentioned above. The one difference might be making 2016 a real year for the minimum rather than a void season. This way Berry can technically honor the year if he is capable of playing in the future."
Lookin' good! Flip through our photo album of NFL cheerleaders.
Health is the first priority. Now. Always. As long as you need, man. As long as it takes. Get right.
Besides, there are plenty of other ways to tighten this bad boy's belt.
Even if it might mean trimming your wardrobe. Again.
"I would imagine that they will restructure the contract of Alex Smith, which will create over $8 million in cap space for the team," Fitzgerald says. "If things are really tight, then (backup quarterback) Chase Daniel or maybe (punter) Dustin Colquitt could be in some danger in the summer. If Daniel has any trade value, I would think the Chiefs would consider that."
You can follow Sean Keeler on Twitter at @SeanKeeler or email him at seanmkeeler@gmail.com.
