On Monday, March 3rd, the NFL Insider Ian Rappaport reported that the Philadelphia Eagles were going to cut six-time pro bowler and 2017 All-Pro cornerback Darius “Big Play” Slay. If he’s designated as a post-June 1 cut, the Eagles would save $4.3 million toward the 2025 salary cap..
Now, this isn’t the first time the Eagles and Slay have had a release/cut situation. On March 15, 2023, the Eagles released him, only to re-sign him on a new deal the next day. So this isn’t going to be an ‘Ode to Slay’ because there’s a slim but real chance he finds his way back on the roster for a smaller number. He deserves one of those, and when his future becomes a little more definite, he’ll get one. This is about finding other players who could be cut or have their contracts restructured to give the team more cap room.
To sign big-time players, you need big-time money
The talk of the early offseason is all about which team is going to trade for six-time All-Pro, six-time pro-bowler, and 2023 Defensive Player of the Year Myles Garrett. At the beginning of Super Bowl week, he requested a trade from the Browns and said he wanted to go to a winning franchise.
The Eagles are an obvious candidate for that trade, but it’s a little more complicated than just ‘We’ll give you X, Y, and Z for him’ because he is being paid, wants, and deserves a whole bunch of money. In order for the Eagles to be able to pay Garrett (and other free agents in general), they might need to free up some money. One really good way to do that is by cutting players and restructuring deals.
Salary Cap talk is boring, and a lot of that is because it’s confusing. The best way to think about it is that the salary isn’t real, but it does limit what teams can do. There’s a number that teams can’t go over ($279.2 million in 2025), but smart general managers and front offices can finagle their way around that number with big-brained contract moves.
These are some players who a small and smooth-brained person like myself sees as potential guys who could get cut or restructured. The terms and lengths of restructured deals and timing of cuts are up to the smart guys. All of these numbers and projection-type things are coming from Over The Cap.
The overdue: James Bradberry
The idea behind cutting a player with a post-June 1 designation is that you’re getting salary cap space to sign players who don’t cost much, like rookies. Free agency is in March, and the draft is in April, so the cap space gained from the post-June 1st cuts doesn’t affect what’s going to the cap space to sign free agents at the start of free agency.
The other aspect of this is that trading for Myles Garrett after June 1st would be a benefit for both the Eagles and the Browns: the Eagles could have a little bit more money, and the Browns would get more cap room (which they desperately need).
The only person to ever say anything bad about James Bradberry was Deebo Samuel, so you can just throw that in the trash. From a human-being perspective, it stinks to think about Bradberry like this… but from a football perspective, he’d be a good person to cut after June 1st.
If the Eagles did that with him, they would get $2.1 million in cap space. He was out the entirety of the 2024 season with a leg injury, but even if he hadn’t been on the IR, he wouldn’t have had any playing time. We’ll always remember the 2022 season, but it’s about time to hit the dusty trail.
The reconciliation: Bryce Huff
On March 13, 2024, the Eagles signed Bryce Huff to a three-year $51.1 million contract ($17 million per year). It will go up there on the Mount Rushmore of Howie Roseman’s worst deals.
The best-case scenario is that after June 1st, the Eagles trade Huff, and the other team takes on his whole contract. But there are no general managers who are bad enough to do something like that — and there are a lot of bad general managers.
In reality, a Bryce Huff trade would probably mean his contract gets restructured so that most of his money comes from bonuses (signing bonuses, guaranteed money, etc.). When a player is traded, the new team takes on the salary, and the old team pays the bonuses and guarantees (a.k.a. dead money).
The hope is that the Eagles' dead money hit this year is less than it would be to keep Huff on the team. If that’s the case, then mission accomplished.
The unfortunate: Dallas Goedert
Dallas Goedert is a tough one because he’s awesome. Hell, he was just the Eagles' leading pass catcher in the postseason with 17 receptions for 215 yards and a touchdown. When you need a big play and want to hit someone who will give you at least six yards after the catch, Goedert is that guy.
Unfortunately, that’s when Goedert plays. He’s only played in 51 of the past 68 games, and those missed games are largely due to injuries. He also just turned 30, so there’s no reason to think that he’ll become more durable.
Basically: Dallas Goedert rocks, but he’s getting older, and trading or cutting him after June 1st would save the Eagles $4 million.
The Eagles are a better team when Dallas Goedert is on the field. Keeping him would only really be smart (money-wise) if they were to renegotiate his deal and pay him just for 2025, and that’s probably not something he would want to do.
Otherwise, keeping him means paying him to play during his age-31 season. That doesn’t seem like something Howie Roseman would be willing to do. This stinks.
The long shot: Lane Johnson
In March of 2023, Lane Johnson signed a one-year extension to keep him with the Eagles through 2026. That extension was for $33 million, and $30 million of it was guaranteed. Somehow, some way, through the miracles of accounting and contracts, it lowered his 2023 cap hit by almost $10 million.
Right now, Johnson’s cap number for the 2025 season is $17 million. If, and that ‘if’ is doing a lot of work, Lane would be willing to restructure his deal or sign another extension, that number could also be lowered.
The problem here is his age and how many more years he has left in him. Before the Super Bowl, he said, “I'm definitely playing next year. That's really how you take it I guess when you get up in age, is take it one year at a time. But physically, I feel a lot better than I have the past…For being this late in the year, it's usually not like that.”
He’s almost definitely not going to commit to playing in 2027, which would be his age-38 season. If he did, he’d probably try to take the Jason Kelce approach and sign one-year deals every year, but hey, stranger things have happened.
Don’t blame me for wanting Lane Johnson to stay in my life for as long as possible. It makes me feel warm and cozy knowing that Lane Johnson is a Philadelphia Eagle, and that’s a feeling that I’m willing to chase by throwing out wildly improbable and irresponsible scenarios that would keep him with the team for as long as possible.