Jansen's Future in Doubt?

But restructuring deals do not involve any sweetening of the pot. The player still gets the exact amount of money his contract says he gets. Take Jansen for example. He's supposed to make $4.5 million or whatever in base salary this season. A restructure means they give him $4.0 million as a signing bonus right now, in a lumpsum payment, and pay him the other $500,000 in game checks starting in the fall. This is a lot better than waiting until the fall to collect the $4.5 million in game checks. But it's still the same amount of money.

Possible reasons things would go south with Jansen:
- He doesn't want to be a Redskin anymore, so he won't help the team out with a simple restructure.
- He's demanding a pay raise, and is threatening to hold out.
- The team thinks he's garbage and is asking him to take a paycut.

I don't see any reason to believe any of those scenarios are the case. They're certainly plausible, but until I hear something more substantial than La Canfora's speculation in his little blog, I'm going under the assumption that things are just fine with Jansen.

The Philly media built a mountain out of a molehill with Donovan McNabb's apparent unhappiness with the team. Same thing is happening here, though to a lesser extent. Media sensationalization at its best.

Correct if I wrong, but I thought in order to get a decent amount of cap relief in a restructuring deal you have to extend a contract by a couple of years. You will not get much relief if you keep the same amount of money over the same amount of time. You might get relief for the first year, but you will have even a worse problem the next year unless you extend the contract. If extending the length of the contract is needed, not every player will want that. That is where sweetening the deal or enticement comes into play.
Either way at some point the bonus money has to count against the cap. Pay me now or pay me later, the Skins will have to dedicate signing bonus money to the cap sooner or later.
I do not like this game of hide and seek with the cap. We were a below .500 team in 2006 and we are over the cap. Not very good player or money management skills.
Some are so in awe over Snyder and his cap skills. I frankly think it is not a very good example how to run a successful NFL team. The proof was on the field in 2006.

Correct if I wrong, but I thought in order to get a decent amount of cap relief in a restructuring deal you have to extend a contract by a couple of years. You will not get much relief if you keep the same amount of money over the same amount of time. You might get relief for the first year, but you will have even a worse problem the next year unless you extend the contract. If extending the length of the contract is needed, not every player will want that. That is where sweetening the deal or enticement comes into play.
Either way at some point the bonus money has to count against the cap. Pay me now or pay me later, the Skins will have to dedicate signing bonus money to the cap sooner or later.
I do not like this game of hide and seek with the cap. We were a below .500 team in 2006 and we are over the cap. Not very good player or money management skills.
Some are so in awe over Snyder and his cap skills. I frankly think it is not a very good example how to run a successful NFL team. The proof was on the field in 2006.

You are wrong in a general sense, but right when it comes to Jansen, and I didn't think of this before, so I beg your pardon.

You don't always have to extend a contract to get cap relief. Let's continue with the example of converting $4 million from base salary into signing bonus. If the player has 4 years left on the deal, then that signing bonus allocates out to $1 million per season. So you took that $4 million and reduced it down to $1 million in the present year, saving $3 million in cap space. Yes, you'd have to absorb an extra million in each of the future years remaining on the contract.

But Jansen is only signed through 2008 (two more years), so taking that $4 million, we'd spread the hit over only 2 years. This would make his cap figure drop by $2 million this season, but increase by $2 million next season. At that point his 2008 cap figure would be high: $8.3 million. And the team likely doesn't want to do that. You're right, they're probably trying to think about extending him. And that could get hairy. And since they could save $2.6 million in cap space by cutting him this season, they are probably in position to let Jansen bring his price down (and if he doesn't, just cut him).

Thanks for keeping me on my Ps and Qs when it comes to Jansen. Now I can definitely see how the team may run into a problem with him. He might want a big bonus to extend, and the team might not like that idea. I can definitely see how it'd get sticky. (public apology and retraction of my previous criticism of LaCanfora goes here).

After thinking on the cap situation further, definitely seems like a real possibility Jansen will be gone. It all depends on their ability to agree on reasonable extension terms.

I still don't understand the issues with Springs though.

restructuring is doing the team a favor, so generally, you get more money for helping them out (unless you're really in danger of being cut and losing real money due to your contract and your poor performance).

whether your willing to restructure or not doesn't necessarily have that much to do with wanting to be a redskin. If the FO was more careful in contract valuations and budgeting, they wouldn't need to beg the players to rework their deals every year.

and why wouldn't a player rather get more money up front? cause the backloaded portion makes him much more likely to get cut later, or be subjected to yearly restructures to continually extend the bacloaded year from coming due.

He's not going anywhere, unless Joe2 decides to let him go.

restructuring is doing the team a favor, so generally, you get more money for helping them out (unless you're really in danger of being cut and losing real money due to your contract and your poor performance).

This isn't true. At least not with the 'Skins. All of our restructures last year were simple restructures. The net impact to cash flow was 0. Each player accepted their base salaries up front in a lump sum payment. They didn't get any more $ than their contract called for.

You run into trouble when a player is nearing the end of his contract. If you want to clear salary cap for those players, you need to extend them.

For those who still think his future is in doubt...its allegedly being reported on Comcast that Jansen signed a four year extension worth 22 million dollars.

EDIT:

Welcome to Comcast SportsNet (http://midatlantic.comcastsportsnet.com/view_content_0p.asp?ID=44621)

Done deal

This seems like an immediate cap relief move more than anything. Looks like we will save ~3 million for this year. Still, this could just be a move to soften the blow of losing Dockery, should it come to that.

I don't like the idea of paying a guy who had a subpar season with multiple years left on his deal, but if the alternative was to cut him, I agree with the road they've taken.

thats a good move. i'm glad he wants to stay and i'm glad that the skins gave him a good deal. i wonder how much money this move saves the on the skins cap ?

lets hope this trend continues (dockery)

How many sacks did jansen give up this year? I know he didnt have a pro bowl season, but he will probaly be more comfortable next season and do even better.