This is the third article in a six-part series looking at the teams who are currently projected to be $20 million or more in the red in cap space for 2024, and the path forward for them to get under the cap. The full list of teams includes:

• New Orleans Saints: -$98.7 million
• Los Angeles Chargers: -$57.3 million
• Buffalo Bills: -$52.7 million
• Miami Dolphins: -$51.3 million
• Denver Broncos: -$26.8 million
• Dallas Cowboys: -$21.4 million

While we don’t have a formal projection for the 2024 cap yet, it’s safe to say that number will end up north of $240 million, growing by more than $16 million for the second consecutive year. Before we dive into the Bills, here are some quick salary cap-related notes and definitions, as this can be a complicated subject.

• Salary cap: The cap is the maximum any NFL team can spend on player salaries. Essentially, every team gets the same pie and can choose how to split it up, with various accounting mechanisms to manipulate how much cap space is available in any given year.
• Dead Money: A term for money that has already been paid to a player and will count against a team’s salary cap no matter what. Most of the time this comes from signing bonuses, either from when a deal is initially signed or from restructures. When a player is cut, all the dead money remaining on their contract accelerates to the current year.
• Restructure: An accounting trick teams can use to manage the cap in a given year. Signing bonus money is always prorated (spread equally) over the remaining years of a contract. That means teams can convert all but the minimum of a player’s base salary to a signing bonus and reduce the cap hit at the expense of increasing dead money in future years.
• June 1 designation: Another accounting trick for teams — after June 1 when a player is cut the dead money is split over two years instead of all accelerating to the current year. Teams can designate two players per year as “June 1 cuts” and cut them before that date without the dead money hit, although they don’t get the resulting cap savings until after that date either.
• Void years: Essentially “dummy” years that are added onto a deal, usually to help spread out the cap hits with restructures. They are not actual contract years that teams or players are required to fulfill.

If you’re a visual learner like me, Over The Cap’s team cap calculator is a handy little tool to play around with and get a sense of how all of these terms and numbers shake out in real life. I leaned on it heavily when breaking down the cap situations and path forward for these teams.

With the homework out of the way, let’s get into it…

Buffalo Bills: -$52.7 million

This upcoming offseason will be critical for the Buffalo Bills as they try to keep their Super Bowl window open. Everything they’ve done over the past two years has been geared toward trying to keep this team at the top of the AFC, and by that measure the Bills might have already failed by sinking into the wildcard mix. Even with this past week’s domination of the Cowboys, Buffalo is still in danger of missing the postseason unless it can take care of business over the next three weeks.

Bills GM Brandon Beane has to knock it out of the park this offseason and he does not have a lot of margin for error. The first task will be clearing more than $50 million of cap space to get under the cap, plus whatever budget they need to make additions in free agency. Restructuring QB Josh Allen’s contract saves $23 million against the cap in 2024 and it should be an easy decision. It’s a huge chunk of potential flexibility, and the whole team is built around Allen anyway.

There probably won’t be very many other easy decisions for Beane. He has to figure out the future of two players who are supposed to be superstars and core players on each side of the ball, WR Stefon Diggs and DE Von Miller. Outside of Allen, those two have the biggest current cap hits in 2024.

The Diggs Dilemma

In the case of Diggs, there was some instability this past offseason that’s worth keeping in mind as it relates to his future in Buffalo. Is he still happy and does he want to keep catching passes from Allen? Did firing OC Ken Dorsey take away the problems he seemed to have with the offense in the spring, and will he be on board with the new hire? He’s still highly productive but he’s on the other side of 30, so how long can the Bills expect him to remain a top wideout?

If all of those questions are answered, it’s hard to see Diggs someplace else. His $18.5 million 2024 base salary becomes guaranteed on March 19, and if the Bills keep him it makes sense to restructure that for over $13 million in savings.

It’s also worth pointing out that Diggs’ contract shouldn’t scuttle any potential trade market if that’s how things shake out. The Raiders gave up a haul for WR Davante Adams at a similar point in his career. If the Bills did trade Diggs, they’d probably have to turn right around and invest those assets into trying to replace him, especially because No. 2 WR Gabriel Davis is also a pending free agent. But for now, let’s pencil Diggs into Buffalo’s plans for 2024.

Goodbye Von?

Miller already has $10.7 million of his $17 million 2024 compensation guaranteed and the rest will be guaranteed at the start of the new league year. It’s the result of Buffalo being so desperate to land him as a free agent ahead of the 2021 season that they agreed to guarantee three years of salary for him, the final concession that pried him away from the Rams. It was a clear gamble at the time for Miller who was already 32 and it’s fair to say it hasn’t played out how the Bills hoped. He had eight sacks in 11 games in 2022 before tearing his ACL, and while he’s played nine games this season he has yet to record a sack.

To make matters worse, there have been issues off the field. An arrest warrant for domestic violence was issued for Miller at the end of last month. The details are disturbing, and Miller has a history of volatile behavior with what appears to be the same woman who is currently pregnant with their third child. For now, she’s not pressing charges, which means there’s not a lot authorities or the NFL will do. A suspension would void the remaining guarantees in Miller’s deal and allow Buffalo to cut him with no remaining obligations.

The team could still cut Miller with a June 1 designation before the rest of his salary guarantees, leaving them with a $17 million dead cap hit this year and another $15 million-plus in 2025. The longer Miller is ineffective on the field, the more likely that outcome looks.

Cap Casualty Candidates

There are other hard decisions the Bills will need to make with key starters whose salary might not justify their current production anymore. Former starting CB Tre’Davious White has a $16.6 million cap hit and tore his Achilles this season. He had already been struggling to reach the same level he’d been playing at before tearing his ACL in 2021 and has appeared in just 21 of a possible 50 regular season games the past three years. His side decision here might be influenced by other decisions they make in the secondary.

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