It turns out the Cardinals will experience some salary-cap relief for 2022 after the Wednesday release of defensive tackle Jordan Phillips, but they won’t get it until June 2.
After the start of the league year at 1 pm Arizona time Wednesday, the Cardinals terminated Phillips’s contract with a post-June 1 designation. Phillips couldn’t have been released before that for the team to use the designation, which can only be used twice by a team each year.
The mechanism was put in place several years ago mostly as a benefit for players because teams would wait until after June 1 to release a player, but that would delay their availability on the open market until then.
Proration of signing bonuses is affected by when the player is released. A player released on or before June 1 results in all remaining signing bonus proration accelerating onto the salary cap for the current year. By waiting until after June 1, the cap charge of the current year is only what the proration would have been for that year with the remainder going on the cap for the following year.
Six other NFL players were released with the designation Wednesday after the start of the league year: Bears running back Tarik Cohen and linebacker Danny Trevathan, Raiders linebacker Cory Littleton and defensive end Carl Nassib, Titans wide receiver Julio Jones and Commanders safety Landon Collins.
As explained in the story after his release Wednesday, Phillips currently counts more than $13.3 million against the cap. Included in that figure is his $10 million base salary plus slightly more than $3.3 million in signing bonus proration. However, there is $5.9 million of proration in future years.
Had the Cardinals released him without the post-June 1 designation, his salary would have been taken off the books and $9.2 million of proration would have accelerated onto the cap for a savings of about $4.1 million.
Now, for cap purposes, it is as if he is still on the roster even though he is a free agent. On June 2, the salary will disappear from the cap accounting and the Cardinals will have a dead charge of $3.3 million this year and $5.9 million in 2023.
Some might say the extra $4.1 million could be used now rather than have $10 million become available on June 2. However, there will still be cap space needed for draft choices, any players signed later and to have a reserve if/when injuries hit. Additionally, teams are able to roll over any unused cap money in one year into the next season.
The bottom line is that an under-achieving player who was often injured won’t be on the team in 2022.
More must-reads: