A couple of questions

A lot of you guys understand salary cap and CBA stuff better than l. So here goes.

Question, the first. The Steelers have already advanced AB something like $6MM the last two yrs from the back end of his current contract. Doesn't this pretty much mean they have to redo/extend his deal? If they have him play out the current deal, there's very little $ left in it. He'll be playing for something like the NFL minimum this year, and that won't go over well. Does this mean that the option of letting AB play out his deal and either trade/franchise him in '18 isnt really an option?

Question, the second. Suppose they do a new deal with AB, and suppose they franchise Bell. Franchising Bell means a top-5 RB salary cap in '17. Ben's contract has to start making serious cap hits by now. Where would they be cap wise, if they franchise Bell, sign AB to a reasonably big contract and and consider all the other existing deals and other signings they'll have to so?

 

1) Over the cap, still has AB making 13 million next year. They are usually up to date but even if he had to play for league minimum so what. Still got to honor that contract no matter when you got the money.

2) We got like 42 million in cap space. Tagging Bell would cost 12.3 million and put us at around 30 million left to sign Harrison, Villaneuva, Cockrell, Boswell, Nix, Hamilton and Dangerfield(think they signed deals) Finney, DWill, Timmons, and Landry Jones(if they wanted) and many more. We might have 3 bucks left. If they do give AB a new deal, probably give him a nice signing bonus and bring his cap hit down this year? I don't know how that **** works to be honest.

 

Trade both AB and Bell problem solved