Nov 12, 2023; Minneapolis, Minnesota, USA; A New Orleans Saints helmet during the game between the Minnesota Vikings and the New Orleans Saints at U.S. Bank Stadium. Mandatory Credit: Jeffrey Becker-USA TODAY Sports
The New Orleans Saints 2024 salary cap is one of the scariest you’ll ever see. For years, the Saints have staved off a rebuild by restructures, cuts, and salary cap shenanigans. However, even the most illiterate salary cap people know one thing. If you keep kicking the can down the road, at some point the bill comes due. We saw this happen with the Los Angeles Rams who had to make massive cuts and run with a roster full of rookies because that is what they could afford. Somehow, the Saints keep staving off the issue but in 2024, the bill is finally coming due.
New Orleans Saints 2024 Salary Cap
Let’s start with the raw numbers of the New Orleans Saints 2024 salary cap. After all the numbers are added up, Spotrac predicts that the 2024 salary cap will be around $243 million. With all of their contracts plus the dead money, the Saints will sit at around $333 million putting them a whopping $89 million over the cap. To give you an idea of how bad this is, the next team most over the cap is the Los Angeles Chargers who are projected to be $45 million over the cap. The Saints almost double the next closest team! Where are all these cap hits coming from?
Top Salary Cap Hits
In the offseason, the Saints figured they were a quarterback away and signed Derek Carr to a huge deal. That hasn’t worked out great and the only reason they are sniffing the playoffs is the rest of the NFC South is playing hot potato with the division crown. Carr carries a $35 million cap hit next year. After that Ryan Ramczyk is at $27 million and Marshon Lattimore is at $25 million. Cameron Jordan and Alvin Kamara round out the top five at $23 million and $18 million respectively. At this point, many teams would look at simply cutting some veteran players to save some cap but for the Saints, it isn’t that easy.
Restructures
Restructures are the reason the New Orleans Saints 2024 salary cap is an issue. Part of the way that a team can kick the can down the line is to restructure contracts. Adding void years and delaying salary to future years can help bring in talent now to win. This is how the Saints have been able to continue to sign players despite having so many hefty numbers. However, the reason that the Saints are in trouble is that a huge portion of their cap is in restructures and void years. In total, the Saints will have almost $55 million simply in restructuring bonuses. This includes $10 million to Jordan, $7 million to Michael Thomas, and $9 million to Lattimore. On top of that, Jameis Winston and Andrus Peat are in void years and will count against the cap.
What Do The Saints Do?
The good news for the Saints is that the Rams have given them a little bit of a blueprint of how to do this. They are going to have to tear this down to the studs. Expensive veterans will have to be traded away for cheap draft capital. Restructures might have to continue in order to get under the cap number. New Orleans will have to rely on a huge amount of young cheap players next season. It isn’t the worst position to be in however, it does put your coaching staff to the test. Coaching up undrafted free agents is a lot different than coaching a veteran team.
Was It Worth It?
For the Rams, going all in brought them a Super Bowl. I am in the camp that if you win a championship, anything is worth it. While the Rams had to trade away some great players to get under the camp, they have a Lombardi trophy to show for it. The Saints don’t have that. They barely have the playoff wins to show for it. The New Orleans Saints 2024 salary cap never should have gotten the way it did. At some point, teams have to choose to rebuild. The Saints kept telling themselves they could compete even though they couldn’t. It will be interesting to see how they get under the cap in the offseason.
