Vikings Salary Cap Space Update After Reiff, Colquitt Moves — What's Next?

A couple weeks after being well over the projected 2021 salary cap, the Vikings have done well to maneuver under the cap. It's just a start, but the team has cut some high-priced veterans and made a couple other moves to create space. Not only have the Vikings set themselves up to be cap compliant when the new league year begins in less than a week, they have additional moves to make that could give them ample room to made some key additions in free agency.

Importantly, they also now have clarity on exactly how much they'll be able to spend. The NFL set the salary cap at $182.5 million on Wednesday, which is $2.5 million above the $180 million floor that Minnesota was basing its operations off of previously. Add in the roughly $4.5 million of rollover cap space that the Vikings have from 2020 and their cap is $187.3 million for this season. That's a pretty big drop from the year before, but it could've been worse.

Here are the moves Rick Spielman, Rob Brzezinski, and the rest of the front office have made so far this offseason:

• March 2: Released Kyle Rudolph (+$5.1 million in cap space)
• March 4: Signed Stephen Weatherly (–$2.5 million)
• March 5: Released Cordrea Tankersley and Tae Hayes (+$450,000)
• March 8: Declined to tender Chris Jones (+$260,000)
• March 9: Released Dan Bailey (+$1.04 million)
• March 10: Released Riley Reiff (+$11 million)
• March 11: Restructured Britton Colquitt (+$1.375 million)

That's roughly $16.7 million in cap space created over a ten-day span, and more moves are coming. But for now, the Vikings have roughly $10 million in available space underneath their $187.3 million cap. That $10M isn't an exact number, as I've seen figures ranging from $9.5 to $10.4 million depending where you look, but it should give you a general idea of where the Vikings are at.

$10 million is far from enough to sign free agents and a draft class, but at least Minnesota isn't one of the eight teams still over the cap. They've gone from having among the least cap space in the league to being 21st, as things stand right now. 

And they're not done. Here's a look at some of the major remaining moves the Vikings can make.

Cut/restructure DT Shamar Stephen 

I'd expect this to happen at some point. Michael Pierce coming back makes Stephen's run-stopping ability much less important. A cut would create $3.75 million in space while coming with $1.3 million in dead money. He doesn't have any guarantees coming up, so the Vikings can be patient and identify a free agent replacement before doing this. They could also ask him to take a pay cut to stick around.

Cut/restructure LB Anthony Barr

With Reiff gone, Barr is the most interesting remaining contract on the books. His cap hit of just over $15 million is the third-highest on the team, which doesn't make a lot of sense considering what he's done on the field in recent years and the fact that he's coming off of a major injury. A cut would free up $7.2 million in cap space but would carry even more ($7.8 million) in dead money. Barr has said he won't take a pay cut, and an extension probably isn't happening for a player already under contract through 2023. A restructure that lowers his cap hit in 2021 might be the most logical outcome, as the Vikings would be in a tough spot at linebacker if they released him.

Extend Danielle Hunter and/or Harrison Smith

I wrote about these two as extensions candidates recently, so I won't re-hash all of that here. Go check out that article and ignore the now-outdated Reiff section at the end. The gist of it is that extensions for these two stars could give them more guaranteed money to ensure they remain in purple for years to come, while also lowering their 2021 cap hits (Hunter's is the second-highest on the team, Smith's is sixth). There's some risk here with Hunter coming off of neck surgery and Smith being 32, but the risk is worth it for players who are among the league's best at their positions.

Convert salary to signing bonus for Adam Thielen

Thielen has the fourth-highest cap hit on the roster, but it shouldn't be difficult to lower that number by a good amount. $11.1 million of his $13.5 million cap hit is base salary, so converting that to prorated signing bonus money could create as much as $8.4 million in space. The Vikings could also do this with Eric Kendricks again, but that seems less likely.

Lastly, the Vikings can make some other minor cuts for players making above the league minimum (Ryan Connelly and Dylan Mabin, for example) for slight gains in cap space with the top 51 contracts rule.

I won't pretend to be an expert and tell you exactly how much cap space can be created by making all of these moves, but it's enough to make things interesting. Spielman and Brzezinski are off to a good start, but there's more work to do.