Dear Fellow Buffalo Bills Fans:
With the tagging of Jairus Byrd there are changes to my last posting on this topic. Assuming that Byrd signs the contract and does not negotiate a long term deal, this is where the Bills Salary Cap breakdown stands as of now.
The Bills 2013 Salary Cap = 123 + 9.8 = $132.8 million
The Bills top 51 players salary = $106,818,609
Dead Money = $5,358,705
Top 51 + Dead Money = $112,177,314
2013 Projected Salary Cap Room = $20,622,686 (YAY!!!!!! Let's go Shopping!!!)
Breakdown by position:
Offense : $51,801,072 ( 39.0%) - 25 players
QB : $12,700,000 ( 9.56%) - 2 players
WR : $11,517,813 ( 8.67%) - 6 players
RB : $8,741,250 ( 6.58%) - 2 players
TE : $4,188,934 ( 3.15%) - 3 players
OL : $14,653,075 ( 11.03%) - 12 players
Defense : $50,474,871 ( 38.0%) - 23 players
DL : $32,055,878 ( 24.14%) - 9 players
LB : $3,829,166 ( 2.88%) - 5 players
DB : $14,589,827 ( 10.99%) - 9 players
Special Teams : $4,542,666 (3.4%) - 3 players
K : $3,000,000 ( 2.26%) - 1 player
LS : $1,061,666 ( 0.80%) - 1 player
P : $481000 ( 0.36%) - 1 player
Dead Space : $5,358,705 ( 4.0%) - 11 players
Unused Space : $20,622,686 ( 15.5%)
Please note that it is estimated that the Bills have a rookie cap $5,180,294. Some of these rookies will take up some of that unused space depending on if their salary exceeds the current top 51 highest paid players. Last year Gilmore, Glenn, Graham, Bradham and Brooks added around $2.5 million to the cap. Also, the dead space could go up depending on more cuts. I'd say a fair estimate of the Bills current amount free to spend towards the cap is around $18 million plus/minus any accumulated dead money and cap savings due to cuts.
As always please let me know if you have questions, comments or there is a mistake in my numbers.
Thanks for reading and I look forward to your thoughts!
[ Edited March 3 to insert references as links]