rmcjacket23
Ravens Ring of Honor
That's been the way its been for years though... most contracts aren't guaranteed at all beyond year 2.All in the guaranteed money and how they structure that. Roster bonuses and guaranteed base salaries are much more prevalent now, while the signing bonus typically isn't eating as much. It makes it much easier to get out of that contract at the end if it doesn't work out. Lots of teams are putting most of the guarantees in the first 2 years as opposed to spreading it out now.
The difference is the usage of the signing bonus. If you want to backload a deal, you gave a huge signing bonus up front and prorate it, so you're lower in the first year and bigger on the back end.
Smarter teams have reduced their signing bonus payouts or eliminated them all together. We're getting better at it, but this franchise was notorious during the Flacco era of giving out large signing bonuses in lieu of smaller year 1 salaries, which essentially pushed dead money into future years, and cost us in the long run if the player didn't pan out (which happened a lot).
Again, that MIGHT make sense if you are expecting a larger-than-normal cap increase in the following year. But that typically doesn't happen.
If anybody wants to know what a bad contract structure looks like (even worse than Joe's first deal), go look at Jared Goff. The Rams are getting ready of half their roster, and its not because they need the space to sign Ramsey. Its because Jared Goff has a $36M cap hit this year, and he costs $26M more against the cap than last year. That's happening because they went very low with base salaries in the first two years, and structured his deal with a lot of roster bonuses, including a $21M one this year.