PatsCap: Don't expect Tom Brady's incentives to affect the Patriots' cap

On Friday we learned more details about the incentives that are now in Tom Brady's deal. Albert Breer tweeted that Brady’s revised deal has five $1-million triggers for 2018:

• Top 5 in QB rating


• Top 5 in completion percent


• Top 5 in yds/att


• Top 5 in TD passes


• Top 5 pass yds

1. While the CBA does not specifically mention player incentives that are dependent on being finishing in the Top 5 in a statistical category, it does mean team incentives - "any incentive bonus that is based upon the team achieving a particular ranking in its performance relative either to other teams in the League, or to other teams in its Conference, automatically will be deemed “not likely to be earned” if it sets a ranking level equal to or higher than fifth from the top of the League or third from the top of the Conference, respectively." If we replace the words team and teams with player and players we can use the logic to classify Brady's incentives as NLTBE. That is, I think that the ranking language is also applicable to individual players.


2. There has to be a reason for the use of the phrase "Top 5" in Breer's report. For example, Tom Brady threw 32 touchdown passes in 2017 finishing third in the NFL. A simpler way to have made touchdown passes LTBE would have been to use a trigger of 32 or fewer TD passes. The only reason to use the phrase "Top 5" is to have the incentive classified NLTBE based on the language in the above paragraph.


3. Whenever an incentive consists of multiple triggers all of the triggers must be classified LTBE for the incentive to be classified LTBE, therefore, tying a Super Bowl victory to the other triggers makes the incentive NLTBE. That is, I expect the incentive to read that Brady will earn $2 million if the Patriots win the Super Bowl AND finishes in the Top 5. Brady's incentives could be tied to an NLTBE trigger such as the Patriots finishing in the top 5 in passing yards.


4. The Patriots wish to keep Brady's cap numbers the same this year. Why? Doing so limits dead money.


5. If the incentives are classified LTBE that would lower my Patriots salary cap space number by $5 million to $2,415,255. $2.4 million is definitely not enough to operate the rest of the season.

• Pay for players 52 and 53, which should amount to $960,000. Right now, all 32 teams are operating under the Top 51 rule, where only the salaries of the players with the 51 highest cap numbers count against the cap.


• Pay for the 10-man practice squad — $7,600 a week for 17 weeks to 10 players equals $1,292,000. We’ll round up to $2,000,000 since Patriots typically pay some practice squad players more than the minimum and the Patriots have in the past cut practice squad players after 4 p.m. on Tuesday when the player has earned that week’s salary.


• Have a cushion for the $3 million in NLTBE 46-man active roster bonuses that could be earned by eighteen players.


• Have a cushion to extend players during the regular season — usually between $1 million and $4 million.


• They also have $1.075 million in reserve Shea McClellin applies for injury protection.


• Have a cushion to replace injured players during the preseason and regular season. This total is usually between $4 million and $6 million. Under the new CBA, the Patriots have placed the following amounts of players on Injured Reserve, PUP (Physically Unable to Perform) or NFI (Non-Football Injury):
  2011: 12
  2012: 11
  2013: 13
  2014: 10
  2015: 20
  2016: 6
  2017: 17