Gettleman stays being the man

[The NFL Shield At Midfield]

albert/veldheer carried a combined cap hit of $20 million in 2015.  their salaries ramped up.  steve smith would also count $6-7 million against the cap for that year even if he had retired.  keep in mind that cpantherking is a huge greg hardy apologist and in his world we extended him probably to big money rather than let him walk too.

so then cam, luke, and greg olsen get extended.  now it's 2016 and veldheer/albert are both counting slightly over $20 million against the cap.  stack $14 million on top of that because norman is playing under the tag.  now we're supposed to blast kawann short and his agent out of the room opening up negotiations by plunking top dollar on the table.  cam, luke, and olsen combined count $31 million against the cap going into this season.

yeah maybe we could have made it work in the short term but if you look at the cap numbers of our top players going forward there is virtually no margin for error in the draft or free agency and we're fuged after 2017.  this is basically the hurney strategy.

e: oh, and don't forget that kelvin benjamin, trai turner with probably a couple more pro bowls under his belt, and andrew norwell are coming up for extensions around the same time too.  and for the sake of realism here i'm assuming charles johnson was cut and signed back because lmaoooooo if he was counting that $20 million or whatever he originally did in 2016

 

[The NFL Shield At Midfield]

even the front offices that everyone here loves to suck off (ravens, packers, seahawks, the colts although not so much anymore, hell even the patriots) have years where lack of depth due to necessity or personnel blunders is exposed

NFL rosters in the salary cap era are basically just rotating their weaknesses around from area to area every year.  remember how everybody said the packers wouldn't miss jordy nelson because they had davante adams and randall cobb?  that team was by no means chopped liver but packers fans wanted to kill ted thompson for that when both of them underperformed.  the seahawks OL was horrible in 2015 and yet what they're about to try in 2016 could potentially make our 2014 line look like the hogs.  the ravens were leaning heavily on 36 year old steve smith and a rookie in 2015 and got burned with UDFA james hurst playing about as poorly as byron bell.  in fact, hurst getting thrown into flacco's knee ended his season.  the colts engaged in a bunch of universally praised moves at the skill positions only to get their quarterback killed.  and on and on and on.

[CPantherKing]

1 hour ago, tiger7_88 said:

How much money was available to spend on free agents in 2014?

If we had spent it on Albert/Veldheer, who would not have been signed?  Who would not have been re-signed?  Who would not have been extended?

Spending more on OTs for more time in the pocket afforded to the QB is more valuable than average WRs.

No extension for Chandler, no tender for Bell, no Avant, no Underwood, no Cason, and no DeCoud. Total $9m.

Panthers instead pay for Albert, Veldeer, and keep Ginn. Total $9m.

Panthers had about $24m to spend at the start of FA.

[Mr. Scot]

1 hour ago, CPantherKing said:

Spending more on OTs for more time in the pocket afforded to the QB is more valuable than average WRs.

No extension for Chandler, no tender for Bell, no Avant, no Underwood, no Cason, and no DeCoud. Total $9m.

Panthers instead pay for Albert, Veldeer, and keep Ginn. Total $9m.

Panthers had about $24m to spend at the start of FA.

You do recognize that the salary cap remained in effect after 2014, right?

[PoundCat]

11 hours ago, CPantherKing said:

I believe the 1st round should be used for defensive players unless a freakishly athletic offensive skill position player is available. The offensive players that would fall in this category are extremely rare.

Thanks for the thoughtful response, and I don't disagree with the individual players you mentioned. We can nitpick about individual moves or things we might have done differently, but it's hard to argue that Gettleman's set of priorities is failing the team. He put in place a long term, multi-year strategy to improve the team and get us out of cap hell, and our Superb Owl appearance is evidence that his plan is working. Not to mention the cap space we have now.