Dolphins Stay Busy Redoing Contract Restructures, This Time With Armstead and Hill
Another day, another report of the The Miami Dolphins restructuring the contract of one of their most prominent players. Actually, it's one better this time because reports are two players redoing their contracts to clear up more cap space.
This time it's tackle Terron Armstead and wide receiver Tyreek Hill redoing their contracts by turning base salary into bonuses.
For the price of money (and cap commitments) down the road, the Dolphins created almost an addition $30 million of cap space with the moves involving Hill and Armstead, according to national reports.
This follows the move with the contract of linebacker Bradley Chubb on Wednesday and the report that Byron Jones will be released at the start of the league year next week to free up another $13 million.
While the Jones cap space won't come into effect until June 1, the moves with the other three will open up more than $40 million of cap space, moving the Dolphins from being some $15 million over the cap to being more than $25 million under the cap to start free agency.
And there certainly could be more moves along the way.
Of the two reports Friday, the one involving Hill was widely expected, and maybe not so much with Armstead.
Hill's cap number before the restructuring was at $31 million but dropped to a way more palatable $12.8 million, per Spotrac. Hill's contract certainly figures to be revisited again in future years, maybe even again next offseason when his cap number again will be at $31 million.
What made the idea of moving Armstead money down the road, spreading his bonus over the remainder of his five-year contract, which has four years left, was a bit more surprising given his age, injury history and some uncertainty as to exactly how much longer he might wind up playing.
DOLPHINS CAP OUTLOOK
With the moves involving Chubb, Armstead and Hill, Jones currently has the highest cap number on the team for 2023 at $18.3 million, followed by defensive end Emmanuel Ogbah at $17.2 million, per Spotrac.
Ogbah, though, is coming off an injury-shortened 2022 season and his 2023 salary is fully guaranteed and the Dolphins might not want to commit more money down the road for him because they could move on from him next offseason fairly painlessly if his performance doesn't justify what the Dolphins are paying him.
The other three players who currently have a 2023 cap number exceeding $10 million are linebacker Jerome Baker, defensive lineman Christian Wilkins and cornerback Xavien Howard.
Wilkins' number easily could be brought down with a new long-term deal that includes a low base salary for 2023 and a spread-out signing bonus. The Dolphins could save more than $9 million by releasing Baker with a post-June 1 designation, which might be a more likely scenario than restructuring his contract.
As for Howard, his contract already has been redone a few times the past few years and his cap number jumps to $25 million already next year, so it's not likely it gets touched again this offseason.
