Ram creates cap space

The 1st of many

“ To help the Saints salary cap, Ramczyk agreed to eliminate his $18 million base salary for 2025 and reduce it to the minimum of $1.255 million. This frees up $16.745 million in cap room, allowing the Saints to carry him on the roster at a $12.33 million cap figure until June 2nd at which point he should likely retire. Prior to this the Saints would have had to carry his cap figure at a $29 million number if they wanted to use the June 1 cut.

Ramczyk’s contract still has $23.066 million in dead money and by using the June 1 release the Saints will be able to split that up across two seasons at $11.083 million in 2025 and $11.983 million in 2026. Overall this puts the Saints in about a $12 million better position with the salary cap than if they released him or allowed him to officially retire in March.”

What was benefit to Ram to agree to this ?

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What was benefit to Ram to agree to this ?

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Probably going to retire anyway, so just delaying the inevitable for the benefit of the team. He wouldn't have received an extra $ whether he retired without renegotiating, or worked it this way

I mean did they give him a roster bonus or something? Idc a financial incentive for him in the reading of the restructuring

If this is to retire, then for all intents and purposes he's retired. They are just asking him to delay the paperwork. It's not like they are going to demand he shows up to voluntary minicamp, OTAs. Whether he retires today, 3/12, 6/02, or 9/04 he would receive the same amount of money $0 with or without the restructure. Why does he need to provide an incentive?

It is also possible that this was already worked out when he did something similar last year and was given a $1.2M guaranteed contract and a $5.3M bonus just to spend the year on IR.

Kick the can into 2026 dead money no matter how you spin it. And some thought that was our year to “circle”.

Players do not get paid in the offseason. If his contract was for $10M, he would not receive his 1/18th payment until after game 1 in 2025. Therefore, that salary number is irrelevant. Whether he files his paperwork to retire now or on 6/02, everything else is the same. Technically he would still have access to the health benefits, access to the Saints training staff & facility, and any other perks the teams provides until he officially retires. So they probably just asked him to do them a favor, any why wouldn't he consider they treated him properly and have already paid him close to $70M over the past 8 years

3 years of 10+ million on the csp for a player that hasn’t played any of those years is brutal.

And he’s still only 30. Should be still playing at an all pro level a couple more years if not for the injury.

So did we burn one of the June 1 cuts on this or do we still technically have 2?