Agreed. And here's a way to do that.
The Rams could sign him for 5 years, $95M ($25M signing bonus) with minimal impact on the 2024 cap if they did something like this:
2024: $2M salary, $5M pro rated signing bonus: cap hit = $7M
2025: $10M salary, $5M pro rated signing bonus: cap hit = $15M
2026: $14M salary, $5M pro rated signing bonus: cap hit = $19M
2027: $19M salary, $5M pro rated signing bonus: cap hit = $24M
2028: $25M salary, $5M pro rated signing bonus: cap hit = $30M
That averages $19M a year and would be the 3rd highest average salary for a guard this year according to [
www.spotrac.com] . But it won't be the 3rd highest in subsequent year as the cap goes up and other guards sign bigger deals.
If the Rams guarantee the first three years salary they would be putting $51M in Dotson's pocket. And if they cut him after the 2026 season he essentially played on a 3 year, $51M deal - an average of $17M a year.
And, if the Rams did cut him after 3 years $10M of his cost would be deferred to the 2027 cap as dead money. Note that the 2027 cap is projected to be $314M [
overthecap.com] .
AlbaNY_Ram
