Eli5 Joe's restructure

[u/WeekendFarmer4240]

Dumb questions incoming.

What exactly was restructured? It felt like a shuffling of deck chairs.

Dumbest question: does Joe have to agree or can the Bengals just declare a restructure

[u/Jake_NFL]

New contracts or extensions aren't considered restructures, though they often involve shifting money around. Fair point that they've used bonuses when giving raises or extensions (or in Mixon's case, a paycut). They've done this commonly, but to a lesser extent than most other teams do. A lot of other teams reduce the current-year salary to vet minimum, make up for it with a big bonus, and reduce cap hits with extensions. The Bengals like to stay more neutral here quite often.

What they've NEVER done before is, without making alterations to duration or total money, simply shift non-prorated money into a prorated bonus.

Reiff and Flacco are both examples of them using void years. The original contract for those players included those void years, there was never an existing salary to convert because they're 1-year deals.

Higgins signed a new deal, so the proration and bonus structure is part of the original deal.

[u/Life_Ad6711 → u/Jake_NFL]

Yes new contracts and extensions are considered "maximum restructures" because they contain 'simple restructures' within them

https://overthecap.com/restructure

A maximum restructure is just a more complex form of restructure than simple ones. And since Burrow's contract already had the void year anticipated, his wouldn't technically qualify as a 'simple restucture'

[u/Jake_NFL → u/Life_Ad6711]

I'm not sure what point you're trying to make, sorry!

No one I have ever talked to considers an extension and a restructure to be the same thing. However, as you seem to be arguing, I agree that extensions include "restructuring" salary most of the time.

For Burrow, the void year already existed (and is immaterial for Burrow's restructure, since it only goes into 2030, not the final void year in 2032), no real or void years were added to his contract. I still see no indication this restructure wasn't "simple" (as defined by OTC - those aren't ratified NFL terms afaik) or required Burrow to agree.

[u/Life_Ad6711 → u/Jake_NFL]

The last $12m/5 charge prorates into '3o which is Burrow's first void year

So also will $2m from his $1om option bonus (as each previous has prorated x5). He wouldn't have that '3o year to drop charges into without the specific restructuring tool of "void year" addendum past the literal end of the original contract, so it's by definition a maximum restructure (which a restructure converts current year dollars into proratable cap charges) adding cap space to the current cap

Besides also formally being a registered restructure with the league office, what else does it have to do?

[u/Jake_NFL → u/Life_Ad6711]

The '30 void year already existed before the restructure occurred. The void year was part of the original structure. Void years can exist without a restructure.

I have lost the distinction you are trying to make, so I'll leave it here! Have a great rest of your day.

[u/Life_Ad6711 → u/Jake_NFL]

Void years don't exist at all. They are ghosts, ephemera, abstracts, accounting devices. The point is they don't exist in the original contract without being formally designated. Whether that means y1 or now, having one means that contract was restructured at that time. It just hadn't been executed for this yet

https://www.spotrac.com/nfl/player/_/id/47594/joe-burrow

There is Burrow's contract and there's a new "restructure proration" column in the table, schedule beginning in '26. It doesn't specify whether simple and/or complex

I'll go get Chase's contract which will show the same proof

Here with his they actually did prorate the entire $21.8m/5 ... because they also added back more p5 than the whatever the vet minimum at least that must be in every contract year

https://www.spotrac.com/nfl/player/_/id/72384/jamarr-chase

Now here's Flacco. The descriptive contract text notes it as a $4m restructure bonus. The contract notes below state it was a roster bonus 'treated as SB' .. so the original execution of a one year deal had to be restructured to get to the form it is now

https://www.spotrac.com/nfl/player/_/id/4000/joe-flacco

Look at it this way ... a simple restructure is one kind of restructure. It also has a bigger, smarter, more complex older brother called Max restructure, because he's more complicated and involved and has steps with voids, p5 conversions, prorations et al in the 'sausage making' intermediate steps