A franchise big on reworking contracts made another cap space-clearing move on Tuesday. The Steelers adjusted Vance McDonald‘s deal, Adam Schefter of ESPN.com tweets.
The Steelers tight end agreed to convert $3MM of his base salary into a signing bonus, Schefter reports. This move will free up more than $2MM in cap room. The Steelers came into Tuesday with $3.6MM in cap space — the second-lowest total in the league — and frequently utilize this tactic.
Both Vince Williams and Chris Boswell agreed to extensions last week, and Le’Veon Bell is attached to a $14.5MM salary this season. The Steelers restructured Stephon Tuitt and David DeCastro‘s deals earlier this year. They’ve been big on base-to-bonus conversions in recent years, with VP of football and business administration Omar Khan convincing ownership this strategy would benefit the team as the salary cap continues to rise by approximately $10MM annually.
McDonald is attached to a five-year, $32.5MM extension he signed with the 49ers in late 2016. The new San Francisco regime traded the tight end to Pittsburgh last year.
How many chicken nuggets can you get with $32.5MM?
64 million McNuggets if I’m not mistaken
For how often McDonald is injured, we may be lucky to get 1 year of actual playing time out of that contract. I wonder how much is guaranteed.
According to Spotrac $9.1M (46.31%) was guaranteed.
He will never see 32.5
Vance McDonald pulled a muscle while you were reading this post.