Last year at this time Green Bay had $36.5M of cap space to play with as free agency rolled around.
This year, IF they end up releasing Graham and Taylor, they will have $36.2M.
So why do so many folks think that Gute can't be a player in FA like he was last year?
With those numbers I could honestly see Gute being able to sign 2 splash FA's, like he did with the Smith Bros. last year, and still have plenty of room to extend Kenny Clark.
Not sure how relevant this is, but the team has a lot of FA's in 2021. Bakhtiari, Aaron Jones, Linsley, and Jamaal Williams. The first two in particular will be more expensive, while Linsley should be upgraded. Williams? I really like the guy- excellent blocker, can run for tough yards, and can catch the ball. And he's healthy. My favorite "non-famous" Packer by far. The question being, if they spend a lot of money this year, will they have enough next year to re-sign their priority FA's? Isn't that why they roll over money from one season to the next? I'm more than willing to be educated on this topic if my perceptions are wrong.
Right now, without adding any free agents in 2020, the Packers have $142M on the books for salaries in 2021.
Their current cap for 2020 is at $182M.
So that's $40M without factoring in any increase in the cap going forward.
At the moment, I could see them pass on extending Linsley and look to draft another C/G while they still have Patrick under contract.
That would mean the key 2021 FA's they would need to sign would be Bakhtiari, Aaron Jones, and Kevin King. While I like Williams, he is a 2nd tier player, and keeping him would depend on what he's looking for in a contract extension. There's always RB's to draft and plug/play.
The only other 2021 UFA I haven't mentioned here is Montravious Adams, and I doubt he's in the future plans. He may not even make the 2020 squad.
In 2021, they have 4 RFA's that could eat up $6M - $8M of space if they decide to tender them all, and 13 ERFA's who average about $450K-$500K per player.
Based on this, I don't see a lot of problems in managing these next two years.