ESPN’s Field Yates revealed on Wednesday morning that Eagles defensive tackle Fletcher Cox has recently restructured his contract. Here’s everything you need to know.
As we know, the NFL Trade deadline is approaching and the Eagle need help. The Eagles had around $20M in cap space exiting the offseason and an extra boost of $5M could well be the difference between bringing in a big name in a short-term lunge, and scraping the bottom of the bargain bucket, if the Eagles insist on being buyers.
The bigger picture here is that the team can roll over that value to next offseason. As things stand, the Eagles are currently over the cap by close to $70M. There’s the potential of a Zach Ertz extension as well as a new deal for players like Dallas Goedert and Avonte Maddox to discuss too, without even thinking about the moves needed to create such a hefty amount of cap relief.
It probably helps that Fletcher Cox is once again having a relatively tame year. Malik Jackson has been the DT making the most noise, while Cox has a single sack through 6 games. The franchise pass-rusher isn’t living up to his price tag, making it a little easier to negotiate a restructure in favor of the team.
The Eagles have some tricky decisions to make at DT this offseason and Cox was previously in that conversation. Malik Jackson and Javon Hargrave are also earning top-tier money and the team are going to have to find a way to lighten that load, one way or another.
This isn’t the first time the Eagles have done something like this. Roseman notably guaranteed Alshon’s 2020 salary in order to generate up-front cap relief in order to prepare for the NFL Trade Deadline. Rumors swirled surrounding Darius Slay, who ultimately found his way to the Eagles, but it was Genard Avery who was acquired, making the move prior feel irrelevant.
Here’s to hoping there’s a lot more method to this move than there is madness.
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