Anyone willing to explain how salary cap works?

[WesleyM]

We are in the time of year where the salary cap is being looked at by everyone to try to figure out both who stays and who goes and who we have a realistic chance of being able to afford to resign. In all those threads however their is a lot of verbage thrown around that I as well as I'm sure many others don't have a clear understanding of. I just wanted to make a thread and ask if anyone that is knowledgable about how the cap works and all the ins and outs of it would be willing to take some time and give some explination on it to the rest of us huddlers? It would be much appreciated and mabye we could even get zod to make sort of a football FAQ sticky with all this pertinent information to help us get threw the hell that is the off season.

[ThPantherFan]

There's a set amount of money in a pot.  You pay your players out of the pot.  When the money's gone you have no more to pay the players.  No, this isn't a smart ass answer.  That's the way I can see the cap.  There's a limit to what you can pay and if you dive too deep it will hurt you for years to come.

[cbarrier90]

There's a set amount of money in a pot. You pay your players out of the pot. When the money's gone you have no more to pay the players. No, this isn't a smart ass answer. That's the way I can see the cap. There's a limit to what you can pay and if you dive too deep it will hurt you for years to come.

Then there's the issues of "dead money" - the money owed to players that are released until the contracts they were released from run out that counts against the cap even though they aren't on the roster and "restructuring" - moving the money in the contracts around in order to lessen the cap hit for player(s) for a certain year.

[WesleyM]

Pre-post june 1st cuts and the ins and outs of it would be nice to know as well