ESPN's Pat Yasinskas believes the Panthers will "almost have to cut" LCB Chris Gamble this offseason.

[CarolinaPanthers8789]

Back in 2003 none of them were that good. Our defensive pressure made them look better than they were. But it is hard to say we have any great ones this year either.

Won't disagree with you there but they played better with what amounted to be about the same amount of pressure as this Panthers team had.

[panthers55]

double post- please delete

[panthers55]

I was gonna ask if anyone knows how to do their math around here so if you have the time, how much money would we have if say in a scenario that we: Cut Gamble, Cut Dwill, and trade Beason to a team like Baltimore? or in a better scenario that would help us more.

Could we have enough money that we'd be under the cap and still able to go out and sign guys like Chung and McKelvin for next season?

You can't do much with Beason. Trading him is the same as cutting him and he would cost more to cut than to pay him his salary. We could restructure but that just gives up more dead cap space down the road if he can't play at a high level. Cutting Gross would save 7.7 million or as a June 1st cut it would be 9.7 million with a 2 million dead cap hit in 2014. Cutting D Will only works as a June 1st cut so you would save roughly 3 million in 2013 but have a dead salary cap hit of almost 5 million in 2014. Gamble saves you roughly 7 million if you cut him.

There are other cuts you could make like Ron Edwards, Nakamura, Tolbert, Dwan Edwards and Clausen.

As for signing other guys I have no idea what they would cost.

[Kevin Greene]

Yeah, trading Beason would never happen anyway. 19 tackles since 2011. Not much demand for that.

[carolina-chuck]

Yeah, trading Beason would never happen anyway. 19 tackles since 2011. Not much demand for that.

CP8789 pointed out a good point last night. Baltimore just loss a MLB. They're gonna need one real soon or they'll quickly go down the drain real soon. They have so many holes just like us.

[CarolinaPanthers8789]

What the hell, cut everyone not named Luke or Cam.

[carolina-chuck]

You can't do much with Beason. Trading him is the same as cutting him and he would cost more to cut than to pay him his salary. We could restructure but that just gives up more dead cap space down the road if he can't play at a high level. Cutting Gross would save 7.7 million or as a June 1st cut it would be 9.7 million with a 2 million dead cap hit in 2014. Cutting D Will only works as a June 1st cut so you would save roughly 3 million in 2013 but have a dead salary cap hit of almost 5 million in 2014. Gamble saves you roughly 7 million if you cut him.

There are other cuts you could make like Ron Edwards, Nakamura, Tolbert, Dwan Edwards and Clausen.

As for signing other guys I have no idea what they would cost.

Thank you for the info and your time!!!

[Montsta]

So I'm not really informed when it comes to cap hits, penalties, etc. I keep hearing people say that cutting player x, y, and z won't help us against the cap for 2013. But will these cuts give us relief for 2014 and beyond or are we just fuged for the foreseeable future?

Edit: answered somewhat in posts above.

[Kakarot]

Guess I'm going to have to retire my Gamble jersey to the closet for good. One of my favorite players, but I expect he'll be cut and looking at this cap mess we're in, it would be the right move. Hurney really screwed us with these contracts.

[Marguide]

So I'm not really informed when it comes to cap hits, penalties, etc. I keep hearing people say that cutting player x, y, and z won't help us against the cap for 2013. But will these cuts give us relief for 2014 and beyond or are we just fuged for the foreseeable future?

Edit: answered somewhat in posts above.

We're only fuged for the foreseeable future if we put off making the tough decisions. Handled properly, we can probably be in good shape in 2015.

If our team looks largely the same and we've re-structured half the roster to get under this year, then yeah, we're probably fuged for the foreseeable future.

[panthers55]

Originally the cap was going to go up a bunch in 2014 due to the new TV contract. But apparently the league borrowed against that amount to increase the cap in 2011. So 2014 will look like 2013. Unfortunately teams like the Panthers counted on that and have a ton of contracts which escalate significantly in 2014 and beyond. Unless the league borrows against the future again, starting in 2015 the cap should go up 20-30 million per team IIRC.

[thatlookseasy]

We're only fuged for the foreseeable future if we put off making the tough decisions. Handled properly, we can probably be in good shape in 2015.

If our team looks largely the same and we've re-structured half the roster to get under this year, then yeah, we're probably fuged for the foreseeable future.

^THIS^

The team has to bite the bullet and make some cuts. Some people keep saying that cap problems arent a huge issue, you can just restructure some deals. The problem is that restructuring doesnt solve any problems, it just delays the inevitable- thats how we got into this poo.

[carpanfan96]

It's in fact expected to remain flat past 2015, the latest projections have the 2015 cap at 122 million as of the last owners meeting. The new deal and soaring revenue don't mean a whole lot to the cap with the current setup.

The reason behind that is the NFL didn't borrow for just last year, it did for up to 2015. Which is why the cap wasn't in the 110 million range like expected this current season, nor was it 115 or so last season. So in essence the league borrowed from itself from 2013-2016 or so and the cap is expected to remain flat because of that. The cap for 2016 isn't expected to go up a whole lot either.

http://espn.go.com/n...lary-cap-growth

Where did all the salary-cap money go?

The answer resides in what has happened during the first two seasons of the new collective bargaining agreement. When the management council and the NFL Players Association ran the numbers from the percentage of money going to the players, the salary cap in 2011 was supposed to be less than $120 million. It could have been as low as around $116 million.

To put more salary money into free agency last season, the union was able to shift some of the benefit money into salary money. The result was a $120.375 million cap in 2011.

According to sources, the salary cap was supposed to be around $113.5 million this year. With 427 free agents, a huge cap decrease would have depressed the market and given almost too much contract leverage to teams. The union worked out a deal with the owners to trade off $7.1 million in benefit dollars per team from future years to have a $120.6 million salary cap.

Basically the Cap was supposed to look like this for the deal.

2011 - 116

2012 - 113

2013 - 115

2014 - 118

2015 - 122

Instead it looked like this -

2011 - 120

2012 - 120-121

2013 - 120-121

2014 - 120-121

2015 - 122

[Marguide]

The thing to keep in mind about the cap is it applies to everyone. We're in bad shape now, but with good management going forward, cap problems can be cleaned up in a couple of years. It's going to be tight for everyone, not just us, and teams like Philly and the Jets have similar problems. At least we have a franchise QB.

With Cam, Luke, CJ and a couple other cornerstones, there is no reason this team can't stay competitive as they work through the problems.

It is pretty obvious though that this year's draft strategy is going to be heavily influenced by what we have to do to get under the cap.