How so?

Recall that the $116,729,000 cap is an UNADJUSTED limit based on the Total Revenue from 2007. (For more on how that is calculated check out our Salary Cap 101 page.) That limit can be adjusted up or down based on whether or not players with Likely To Be Earned (LTBE) or Not Likely To Be Earned (NLTBE) contractual incentives reached their defined goals. (For more on LTBE and NLTBE see our Salary Cap FAQ page.) In a nutshell, if a team defined an incentive as LTBE in a player's contract in 2007, then the incentive would have counted against last year's cap. If the player never, in fact, achieved the required goal to trigger the incentive, then a portion of that incentive counts as a credit against THIS year's cap.

Recall that the NFL instituted the notion of LTBE vs. NLTBE incentives to prevent teams from circumventing the cap. The Collective Bargaining Agreement (CBA) even has clear language stating what can NOT be considered NLTBE -- and when in doubt an arbitrator can rule on whether or not an incentive in NLTBE. Obviously, teams in cap trouble can benefit immensely when a perfectly obtainable incentive is defined as NLTBE, wherein they can then push some cap relief into the next season.

However, shrewd teams have used the mechanism in the opposite manner: to free up future cap space. Since the CBA has no provisions stating what cannot be LTBE, teams are free to designate any incentive as such. Teams like the Vikings and Eagles, for example, have been doing this for years. Since they have done a good job managing their cap and creating space, they can afford to "eat" the cap hit for LTBE incentives -- that should really be identified as NLTBE -- knowing that much of the money will be freed up the following season.  In that way, they manage to keep pushing their cap relief into the future.

Note that the Minnesota Vikings actually have a 2008 cap that is over $135 M thanks to the over $18 M in cap adjustment they received this year. Thus, while they may actually be OVER the original $116,729,000 M unadjusted cap, they remain $16.6 M UNDER their adjusted cap. You can certainly expect the team to approach a number of players during the season about re-working their contracts with ridiculously unobtainable incentives, which will be specified as LTBE regardless. That will allow them to again push a positive cap adjustment onto 2009.

You can't fault the Vikings (or any other team that uses this strategy) for playing by the rules -- but it will be very difficult for teams in cap trouble to ever catch up.

For the sake of this installment, we have designated teams that are less than $5M under the cap in RED. These are teams that have little money to sign free agents and may need to make cuts or restructure salaries in order to sign all of their draft picks. Teams in BLACK, which are between $5M and $10M under the cap, are teams that look to be in pretty good shape in terms of adding more veterans and signing all of their rookies without having to take drastic measures. Teams in GREEN are teams that are well under the cap and should have plenty of room to sign free agents and rookies. 

Keep in mind, many teams are making numerous transactions each day which have a bearing on the salary cap values. Also, the cap adjustments themselves are somewhat volatile, as the NFL Management Council is prone to change their calculations on a routine basis. These "unofficial" figures are approximate as of March 15, 2008.