All 49ers

The 49ers Restructure Javon Hargrave’s Contract

Here's the good news: The 49ers created $6.14 million in cap space and reduced Hargrave's 2024 cap hit to $9.2 million, which is reasonable.
Grant Cohn|
The 49ers Restructure Javon Hargrave’s Contract
The 49ers Restructure Javon Hargrave’s Contract

In this story:

San Francisco 49ers

Did they not learn their lesson?

The 49ers have restructured Javon Hargrave's contract, according to OverTheCap.com. Here's the good news: The 49ers created $6.14 million in cap space and reduced Hargrave's 2024 cap hit to $9.2 million, which is reasonable.

Here's the not so good news: Hargrave's cap hit went up in all future years of his contract. In 2025, when he'll be 32-years old, his cap hit will be an astronomical $28.1 million. And if they try to cut him before June 1, they'll create only $3.3 million in cap space and eat $24.8 million in deap cap. Not ideal.

The 49ers just went through this situation with Arik Armstead. In 2023, they restructured his deal to create more cap space in the short term and less in the long term. They knew Armstead's cap hit would balloon to more than $28 million in 2024, and at the time they were OK with that. They thought Armstead was a foundational player on their roster who would stick around.

They were wrong. Armstead had a second straight disappointing season filled with injuries, and suddenly the 49ers couldn't justify keeping Armstead and his outrageous cap hit. So they desperately asked him to take a pay cut, he refused, they released him and now he's on the Jaguars.

The same exact scenario could play out with Hargrave next year if he underperforms or gets injured or both.

The 49ers need to stop restructuring contracts of players who are in their 30s. It's bad business.

Published
Grant Cohn
GRANT COHN

Grant Cohn has covered the San Francisco 49ers daily since 2011. He spent the first nine years of his career with the Santa Rosa Press Democrat where he wrote the Inside the 49ers blog and covered famous coaches and athletes such as Jim Harbaugh, Colin Kaepernick and Patrick Willis. In 2012, Inside the 49ers won Sports Blog of the Year from the Peninsula Press Club. In 2020, Cohn joined FanNation and began writing All49ers. In addition, he created a YouTube channel which has become the go-to place on YouTube to consume 49ers content. Cohn's channel typically generates roughly 3.5 million viewers per month, while the 49ers' official YouTube channel generates roughly 1.5 million viewers per month. Cohn live streams almost every day and posts videos hourly during the football season. Cohn is committed to asking the questions that 49ers fans want answered, and providing the most honest and interactive coverage in the country. His loyalty is to the reader and the viewer, not the team or any player or coach. Cohn is a new-age multimedia journalist with an old-school mentality, because his father is Lowell Cohn, the legendary sports columnist for the San Francisco Chronicle from 1979 to 1993. The two have a live podcast every Tuesday. Grant Cohn grew up in Oakland and studied English Literature at UCLA from 2006 to 2010. He currently lives in Oakland with his wife.

Share on XFollow grantcohn
Home/News