Photo by Michael Reaves/Getty Images
Denver can’t cut or trade Russell Wilson for a very long time.
The Denver Broncos were sold in 2022, a few months after trading for Seattle Seahawks quarterback Russell Wilson. A couple weeks after that sale closed, the new ownership group agreed to a new contract with Wilson before he had even worn the Broncos uniform in a regular season game. It’s been an unmitigated disaster and one that neither side can move on from anytime soon.
The new owners of the Broncos have very deep pockets, but they won’t be able to help this time. The problem with moving on from Wilson isn’t paying him off, it’s about the salary cap.
Denver paid Wilson $57 million in 2022 and $28 million in 2023, but using pro-ration and bonuses, they’ve only accounted for $39 million of that $85 million on the cap. When you move on from a player, the difference in money paid vs money accounted for is accelerated onto the current year and called “dead cap” space. For Denver and Wilson, that figure is $46 million.
By itself, that would be the largest dead cap number in NFL history. The Falcons had to account for $40.53 million in dead cap when they moved on from Matt Ryan in 2022 followed closely by Aaron Rodgers and his $40.3 million dead cap in 2023. The Packers and Falcons had the cap room to manage that and QBs ready to roll on rookie deals to mitigate it. Denver, on the other hand, is among the teams with the least amount of cap space in 2023 and beyond, and absorbing that dead hit is not really an option.
Per Spotrac, Denver is already $19.1 million over the 2024 salary cap. Replacing Wilson’s existing cap hit with the dead cap number would add $32 million to Denver’s 2024 cap number, putting them more than $51 million over the cap. To do that, they would have to convince a team to miraculously trade for their starting quarterback and his large salaries in 2024 and 2025 to the tune of $86 million.
To cut Wilson would make the numbers even worse. His 2024 salary ($17 million) and option bonus ($22 million) are fully guaranteed, so they would also need to be accounted for. That’s another $39 million in dead cap space on top of the existing $46 million in dead cap, for an $85 million total dead cap, more than double the largest in NFL history. That is one-third of the total projected salary cap for the 2024 season and for a player not even on your team!
For the cap, replacing Wilson’s actual cap hit with that astronomical dead cap number, Denver would be $68.7 million over the 2024 cap. No amount of cap magic or Walmart money could take care of that. They would need to slash and burn the roster, replacing veterans with minimum players. It would be the team from the original Major League movie (or the current Oakland A’s).
Perhaps the worst part of the entire situation is that it’s self-inflicted. Wilson had two years left on his deal when he was traded. He had never played a down for them and they still wanted him under contract for seven years to justify their investment.
To add insult to injury, the Broncos already made the most obvious move at their disposal. They fired head coach and offensive play-caller Nathaniel Hackett in December of 2022, before he even finished his first season as Wilson’s coach. They replaced him with well-regarded offensive genius Sean Payton.
Payton came in during the offseason and absolutely lambasted Hackett’s coaching and the way the team was handled in Wilson’s first year. Now, he’s just the second coach that couldn’t help Wilson. Are they going to jettison that guy for a third coach in three years just to fix the QB?
In March 2024 when the NFL league year begins, $37 million of Wilson’s 2025 salary will become fully guaranteed, further extending the madness. They’ll need to wait until 2025 to bite the bullet. If they release him before the 2025 season, his dead cap hit would “only” be $49.6 million, which would actually save Denver $5.8 million on their cap that year.
Buckle up, Broncos fans. You have at least another 17 months of letting Russ smolder.
