Tampa Bay Buccaneers Restructure Shaq Barrett's Contract, Free Up Cap Space

The Tampa Bay Buccaneers found themselves in salary cap hell this past offseason following going all-in during the Tom Brady era to maximize his time with the team to compete for Super Bowls.

Following the 2022 season, Brady retired and the Buccaneers had to decide what direction they would end up going. However, there were major speed bumps in the road as the team had to find a way to get under the salary cap - ultimately having to let go of veterans like RB Leonard Fournette and OL Donovan Smith due to their salary cap hits and their declining performances.

Luckily the Bucs were eventually able to shed enough salaries to get under the cap, but they still found themselves barely hanging on to any sort of spending money moving forward.

With the regular season right around the corner, the Bucs front office needed to clear up some more space to help pay for things such as practice squad salaries and any in-season signings that may occur.

With that in mind, the Tampa Bay Buccaneers moved ahead with restructuring linebacker Shaq Barrett's contract creating an extra $10.468 million in cap space.

Effective today at 4 PM ET, the NFL's Top 51 cap space rule went away for the season.

Many teams created cap space through contract restructures:

49ers George Kittle/Trent Williams: $23.224M
Ravens Marlon Humphrey: $7.536M
Seahawks Jamal Adams: $6.613M
Bucs: Shaq Barrett:…
— Field Yates (@FieldYates) September 6, 2023

With the move, the Bucs now sit at $1.98M in cap now, giving the organization $12.3 million in cap space heading into the 2023 season.

The Buccaneers will have to pay out their practice squad of course so whatever money remains following that will be what they have to work with throughout the season if they decide to make any mid-season moves.

You can follow Caleb Skinner on Twitter @chsnole.

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