Colts still near the top of the NFL in salary cap space, after adding Carson Wentz

Posted by Michael David Smith on February 20, 2021, 1:40 PM EST
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Carson Wentz will bring with him a $15.4 million base salary, as well as a $10 million roster bonus, when he officially arrives in Indianapolis. For the Colts, that’s affordable.

OverTheCap.com lists the Colts at fourth in the NFL with $43 million in available cap space (assuming a cap of $180.5 million) even after accounting for Wentz’s $25.4 million cap hit.

With the salary cap shrinking this season as a result of reduced revenues because of COVID-19, many NFL teams simply can’t afford to take on expensive veteran players. But since the arrival of General Manager Chris Ballard, the Colts have been one of the more careful teams about not putting themselves in a position where they’re tight against the cap.

Wentz is set to carry by far the Colts’ biggest cap hit this season (DeForest Buckner is next at $16 million and on one else on the team has a cap hit higher than $10 million). It’s a cap hit the Colts can easily afford.

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22 responses to “Colts still near the top of the NFL in salary cap space, after adding Carson Wentz”

  1. Same thing was said of Colts this time in 2019 when supposedly hitting “salary cap heaven”. But their vet QB proved to be a repeating injury liability, and careful cap management netted a roster without depth, and some well known FAs retained or “snatched from the cash strapped Chiefs” but who all ended up injury prone or under-performed. Don’t hang a banner just yet.

  3. I went that page. It has the Saints 69M over, Eagles 43M over, Rams ‘only’ 33 over despite paying both QBs. I can’t imagine the Saints get in compliance.

  5. And if Wentz does work out that trade and his salary will be a steal. However, that’s a big if. I have lost all faith in Wentz after he pouted when they drafted Hurts. If his ego is that fragile let him play in the LFL.

  6. jbcommonsense says:
    February 20, 2021 at 2:58 pm
    That is impressive cap management. Not a Colts fan but good work GM Ballard.

    7 1 Rate This

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    Umm, he’s lost 3 draft picks, a 1st, 2nd and 3rd and 2 overrated players now take up 30 % of the cap. That’s horrible.

    Ditching picks while overpaying on the market, is a recipe for disaster.

    I could see if Wentz was a lock but he isn’t at all.

    In fact, Ballard goes right to the hotseat with the move. He could have kept his picks and juat waited for Wentz to be cut because he would have been cut and he wanted to go with Reich.

    When you think about it, it’s horrible GM work.

  7. Yeah, they did a great job paying draft capital for a QB the other team couldn’t wait to unload…

  8. The Colts are on the rise but the AFC is loaded with really good teams who I can’t see them beating.

  9. Jim Irsay is a billionaire. He pays fortunes for guitars and other items of interest to him. He’s not interested in being frugal. He wants to win meaningful football games. The Colts have had one playoff win in the last 4 years. I’ll bet Mr. Irsay would gladly trade every penny of his available cap space for another super bowl trophy.

  10. It’s good they have money….because they are going to need to add another QB to the roster once Wentz starts the season 0-4 with 2 Tds, 7 Ints and 5 Fumbles

  11. So why did the Colts give up draft capital for a player they likely could have gotten for “free” (other than salary) in a few months? They paid to give Wentz as much time as possible to learn the offense. He already has some familiarity and past success with Reich’s offense, so the Colts have made a reasonable bet. Wentz, if he gets back to form (and stays healthy), is a top ten QB. Not top five, but he can win lots of games for a decent team. You choose: healthy, on-track Wentz or Carr? Tannehill? Trubisky? Lock? Darnold? Winston? Taysom Hill? No one has any idea if Wentz can make it back, but if he does, he’ll be a big win for the Colts.

  13. nhpats2011 says:
    February 20, 2021 at 4:26 pm

    It’s good they have money….because they are going to need to add another QB to the roster once Wentz starts the season 0-4 with 2 Tds, 7 Ints and 5 Fumbles. ……………………………………………………………………………………

    YO ! – LII = 41-33

    Give It Up !

  14. Wait. So if you draft really well you have a lot of young players on inexpensive contracts instead of having to sign big name free agents to fill out a roster? Why didn’t the Eagles think of that?

  17. Amazing how every Colts article continues to be all patriots fans commenting. Colts really hurt them badly. These cowards are still obsessed with everything the Colts do. Nobody wants to play in boston, most racist city in the country.

  18. Amazing how every Colts article continues to be all patriots fans commenting. Colts really hurt them badly. These cowards are still obsessed with everything the Colts do. Nobody wants to play in boston, most racist city in the country.
    ————————
    This from the poster who manages to post on every Pats article! As we say in Boston, now that’s wicked funny “!!

  19. Indy’s cap space has nothing to do with the team being “careful” with its cap or spending. Rather, it’s because prior GM Ryan Grigson did a terrible job, leaving few players in their primes worth handing second contracts too. Current GM Chris Ballard needed to largely build from scratch, and he has…but few of those players have come up for extensions yet, leaving a gap in team pay that has allowed it to accumulate cap space. It was the prior GM’s failure to do a good job that opened up a pretty clean slate, and the excellent work of the current GM that has led to the team being as competitive as it has been even without a second contract core of producers on the team.

  20. As an eagles fan i think the colts should spend all their cap on offense and ignore defense totally. That way they can have a top offense where carson plays 75% of the snaps and still go 4 and 12.

  21. adamb182 says:
    February 21, 2021 at 2:44 am

    As an eagles fan i think the colts should spend all their cap on offense and ignore defense totally. That way they can have a top offense where carson plays 75% of the snaps and still go 4 and 12.

    _____________________________________________________

    As an eagles fan it just suck knowing you could of had Metcalf and Jefferson and probably would still have Wentz if you had a good GM, but you don’t! Instead you have a GM who drafted a qb in the second round when you had a lot of other positions to address who went 1-3, couldn’t complete 50% of his passes, took a lot of sacks and fumbled a lot. Enjoy rebuilding for the next 20 years

  22. Is this a way of saying the Colts are cheap because you should have said the Colts are cheap. Ballard is on the 8 year plan of building through the draft via only having two good picks a season and filling the rest of the roster with cheap backups from other teams. Shoutout to drafting that kicker with his Tony Stark robot glasses that makes sure he makes it through the uprights every time. They probably only win 4 games in 2020 without him.

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