The Raiders had more work to do than any other team when it comes to getting under the cap by March 13th and they have reportedly taken some big steps toward that goal.
Defensive end Richard Seymour and safety Michael Huff have each restructured their contracts to create cap space for the 2012 season, according to a report from Brian McIntyre. Seymour lowered his $7.5 million base salary to $925,000 and turned the rest into a roster bonus that will be spread out over the remaining years of the contract. That contract now runs through 2016 after another year was tacked onto the deal to further spread the hit, although the outsized cap numbers and salaries over the next few years make it hard to imagine he’ll be anywhere close to the Raiders at that point.
Huff did pretty much the same thing, turning $3.3 million of his $4 million salary into a roster bonus while two more years were attached to the end of the contract to further spread the hit. These kinds of moves, which save the Raiders more than $11 million in cap space between them, are the easiest way for the Raiders to get down under the cap in time for the start of the league year. It means they will find themselves in pretty much the same spot next year, but that’s the downside to the deals the Raiders handed out in recent years.
There will have to be more of them -- quarterback Carson Palmer and linebacker Kamerion Wimbley both make sense -- but it does seem like the Raiders will be able to get under the cap threshold in time.