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merlin
3. That team takes on the cap hit and the value of the trade compensation is adjusted accordingly.
That's how you might handle future salaries but you can't do that with signing bonuses.
A basic rule of thumb is every penny that a team pays a player has to eventually go against that team's cap.
See those $18.5M Prorated Bonuses in '23, '24, '25, and '26 on the screen shot below? They derive from various signing bonuses that Stafford has already received. And since the Rams paid the bonuses to Stafford the Rams must take the cap hit: there is no mechanism thru trade or otherwise to transfer this obligation to another team.
If Stafford plays out his contract the Rams can absorb the cap hit as shown: $18.5M a year for 4 years.
But if he leaves after the 2022 season it all comes due.
If they trade him after June 1 then $18.5M would count against the '23 cap and the remaining $55.5M would go against the '24 cap.
And if they trade him before June 1 - which I assume is what everyone is discussing since the trade would involve picks in the '23 draft - then all $74M would count against the '23 cap.
Note that a trade actually has to happen after June 1 to get that cap benefit. Unlike when a team cuts a player they can't trade a guy in March and call it a post-June-1 trade for cap purposes.
AlbaNY_Ram