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Packers Salary Cap: Restructuring Aaron Jones can move up to $11.2M out of 2023

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A hefty bill will come due at some point with a restructure, but the Packers can gain some financial flexibility for 2023 with a simple restructure of Aaron Jones’ contract.

Aaron Jones might well be the most valuable player on the Green Bay Packers’ offense. In 2022, Jones eclipsed 1,000 yards for the third time in four seasons and recorded more then 350 receiving yards for the fourth straight season. Jones also finished 6th in the NFL in yards per carry with 5.3, ranking second among running backs.

Those numbers were good for a 4th-place finish among qualifying runners in DVOA, the fourth time in five years that he finished in the top ten. And although Jones set a career-low mark in rushing touchdowns with just two, he scored five times on receptions to give him a total of seven for the season, tying AJ Dillon for second on the team behind Christian Watson (9).

Given Jones’ sustained successes, his age (he just turned 28 in December), and the Packers’ commitment to keeping his touches manageable (no more than 285 in any season of his career), it’s no surprise that Packers general manager Brian Gutekunst said on Friday that he expects Jones to be back in green and gold next summer. However, Jones’ contract is one that the Packers will need to do something about, as he carries a massive salary cap hit of just over $20 million for 2023.

With the cap expected to come in around $225 million next year, the Packers are already something like $16 million over that number just with the contracts already on the books. Thankfully, Jones’ contract is structured in such a way that the Packers can deflate that $20 million cap number, reducing it by as much as $11.2 million for 2023 and shifting those salary cap charges into 2024 and beyond.

The contract that Jones signed before the 2021 season was worth a total of $48 million over four years, with a $13 million signing bonus. That bonus is applied to the salary cap evenly over the four years of the deal at $3.25 million per year. Then before 2022, Jones agreed to an adjustment to his contract, taking on $3.815 million of that year’s base salary as a signing bonus and adding two void years to spread that number out across five seasons.

That makes Jones’ current deal look as follows:

2023

Base salary: $8.1M
Roster bonus: $7M
Per-game roster bonuses: $400k total
Workout bonus: $500k
Prorated signing bonus money: $4.013M

2024

Base salary: $11.1M
Per-game roster bonuses: $400k total
Workout bonus: $500k
Prorated signing bonus money: $4.013M

2025/2026

Prorated signing bonus money: $763k per year — accelerates to $1.526M dead money in 2025 if contract voids

As detailed in the structure above, Jones’ salary cap number comes to $20.013M in 2023 and $16.013M in 2024. Obviously, a cap number of $20 million for a running back in 2023 is untenable, particularly with the Packers cap-strapped as it is — in fact, that number would be about $3.3 million more than the next-closest running back cap hit, Ezekiel Elliott at $16.72M. With the assumption that the Packers would like to drop Jones’ cap hit significantly for next year, how much could the team unload with a simple restructure?

The practical maximum salary cap reduction for 2023 is based on shifting Jones’ roster bonus and as much of his base salary as possible into a signing bonus, then adding another void year onto the end of the deal to spread that money out over five years. With the minimum base salary for a 6-year veteran in 2023 sitting at $1.08M, that means that Green Bay can dump a total of $7.02 million in base salary plus the full $7 million roster bonus into a signing bonus and spread out the cap hit at $2.804M per year through 2027.

Doing so would leave Jones’ contract as follows for 2023:

Base salary: $1.08M
Per-game roster bonuses: $400k total
Workout bonus: $500k
Prorated signing bonus money: $6.817M

That would give the Packers a salary cap hit of $8.797 million for Jones next season, shifting about $11.2 million into future years. This would include an additional $2.804 million in 2024, increasing Jones’ cap hit to about $18.82 million and likely requiring another adjustment of some kind (most likely an extension or a release) for that season.

If the Packers would do this restructure and then decide to move on from Jones next offseason, they would face a $16.845 million dead cap for 2024 on a pre-June 1st release, almost the same number as they would face if they just kept him on the final “real” year of the contract. That could be split up by designating a release as a post-June 1st cut, however, dividing the cap hit up across 2024 ($6.817M) and 2025 ($9.938M).

The Packers could also elect to keep more money on the 2023 cap and reducing the amount of money shifted into future years, either by reducing the number that they convert into a signing bonus or by choosing not to add another void year to the restructured deal. But one other option that the Packers could take is to release Jones in 2023 before his roster bonus comes due on March 19th. That would cost the Packers about $9.55 million in dead money, reducing the cap hit by about $10.46 million. However, doing so would rob the team of arguably its most versatile offensive weapon, and Gutekunst’s comments last week indicate that this is not an option that the front office is seriously considering.

At some point, the Packers will need to eat a large salary cap hit by moving on from Aaron Jones, due to his initial signing bonus and pushing other compensation out into future seasons in 2022 and potentially 2023. However, that is the price that the team will have to pay for keeping his salary cap hits extremely low in 2021 and 2022.

There are a few other Packers who are likely to see their contracts adjusted in a similar manner. David Bakhtiari, Kenny Clark, and Jaire Alexander also have cap hits of more than $20 million each for 2023 and will be candidates for restructures, as are the likes of Preston Smith ($13M) and De’Vondre Campbell ($8M). Look for future breakdowns of some of these other players’ potential restructures here at APC in the near future.


Note: contract details and salary cap projections referenced are provided by Overthecap.com.

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