What Could Be In Store Once June Cap Space Arrives

The Miami Dolphins arrived at a key date on their offseason calendar Monday when they kicked off their OTAs and we're now also two weeks away from another, perhaps even more significant, event.

The famous June 1 date is when teams around the NFL gets some salary-cap relief from players they released earlier in the offseason with a post-June 1 designation. For the Dolphins, that player was Bradley Chubb and the arrival of June will mean an additional $20 million of cap space for the team.

It's cap space that obviously will be significant considering how tight the Dolphins have been under the cap limit for most of the offseason.

The Dolphins entered their OTAs with only $1.5 million of cap space, according to Over The Cap, mostly the result of saddling themselves with almost $180 million of dead cap space as part of their roster overhaul.

The cap situation was bad enough that the Dolphins needed to restructure the contracts of both De'Von Achane and Aaron Brewer, which meant adding cap commitments down the road, to lower their cap space in order to make possible the trade of Jaylen Waddle to the Denver Broncos.

New GM Jon-Eric Sullivan has cautioned against expecting splash signings once the Dolphins get that Chubb money, but that doesn't mean it won't give Miami the opportunity to make some necessary moves, as we break it down.

TAKING CARE OF THE DRAFT CLASS

You may have noticed draft picks consistently signing their rookie contracts over the past couple of weeks, but none of those have been Dolphins players.

There's an obvious reason for that, and it's the lack of cap space.

So one of the first orders of business in June will be taking care of signing the draft class, which will take up $9.8 million of cap space. Remember that in the offseason, only the top 51 cap numbers count against the limit.

The Dolphins also signed their draft picks in June in 2024, with fourth-round pick Jaylen Wright starting things off June 4 and first-round pick Chop Robinson the last pick to sign June 14.

It's probably fair to expect a similar pattern this year, at least when it comes to first-round pick Kadyn Proctor being the last to sign.

VETERAN ADDITIONS ON THE WAY?

While Sullivan said not to expect splash signings, that doesn't mean the Dolphins won't be supplementing their roster.

Because, quite frankly, they would be well advised to do so.

And while we're not expecting any big-money deals, we wouldn't be surprised to see a veteran get more than the minimum base salary, which is basically all the Dolphins gave to free agents during the offseason.

The obvious candidate who first comes to mind who could fit that category is veteran defensive end A.J. Epenesa, who visited the Dolphins a few weeks ago. The Dolphins didn't sign him at the time, but perhaps the groundwork was laid for a future deal — although it's also possible the Dolphins wound up having the same concerns about Epenesa's physical status as the Cleveland Browns did when they failed Epenesa on a physical.

Edge defender clearly stands as one position where the Dolphins could use some help along with safety and maybe cornerback.

COULD THERE BE ANOTHER TRADE?

The last category we have to examine is the possibility of a trade involving a Dolphins veteran, and maybe specifically linebacker Jordyn Brooks.

Sullivan has made it clear that he considers Brooks a foundational piece for Miami and maybe it's a foregone conclusion that he'll get a contract extension, but the fact remains the Dolphins have not yet restructured or extended his contract the way they did with Achane (both) and Brewer (restructure).

And the Dolphins would have had good reason to restructure that contract considering they've been carrying Brooks' $10.9 million cap number so far this spring.

And the reality is that the Dolphins will save $8.4 million of cap space with a dead cap hit of $2.5 million with a Brooks trade occurring past June 1, as opposed to a flip of the two numbers beforehand.

The Dallas Cowboys were rumored to be interested in Brooks earlier in the offseason and now the thought is the Denver Broncos are looking for that one final piece for their already potent defense.

Again, we're not predicting a trade, but we just can't elimiinate the possibility.

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