Well, it's not something the Ram have done recently (see Goff, AD, Cooks, Higbee, etc.) but it's not against the rules as far as I know.
Essentially they could roll the $13.7M from the last year of his rookie deal into the extension, and make it a it a 6-year, $118.7M deal. And then they could structure it to reduce this year's cap hit as you suggested and still keep next year's cap hit low, too - perhaps reduce this year's cap hit by $4M as you suggested, keep the 2021 hit the same and add $1 to each of the last 4 years?
So ... 6 years, $118.7M, $30M signing bonus. (Note: signing bonus can only be spread out for a max of 5 years).
2020 salary $3.7M (plus $6M pro-rated signing bonus) = cap hit of $9.7M
2021 salary $4.6M (plus $6M pro-rated signing bonus) = cap hit of $10.6M
2022 salary $13.6M (plus $6M pro-rated signing bonus) = cap hit of $19.6M
2023 salary $16.6M (plus $6M pro-rated signing bonus) = cap hit of $22.6M
2024 salary $19.6M (plus $6M pro-rated signing bonus) = cap hit of $25.6M
2025 salary $30.6M = cap hit of $30.6M
Frankly, I'm not sure why they didn't so something like that. But from what's been written about the new deal that's not what they did: it's being portrayed as a straight 5-year extension (2021 thru 2025).
Doing that would help with this year's cap for sure, but it wouldn't help with Kupp. Like Ramsey, Kupp's new deal would take effect in 2021: kicking some of Ramsey's 2020 cap hit down the road actually reduces the cap needed to sign anyone else in 2021 and beyond.
AlbaNY_Ram
Edited 3 time(s). Last edit at 09/09/2020 01:41PM by AlbaNY_Ram.
