How The Giants’ Philosophy Shift Toward Free Agency Sets Them Up For The Future

After two straight seasons in which he believed that the Giants could still be competitive while rebuilding, general manager Dave Gettleman had a long-overdue epiphany.

He has now come to realize that to be competitive, a team needs to have quality depth and that when one racks up one bad draft after another as the Giants did from 2013-17, being competitive and having quality depth are not realistic expectations.

So Gettleman, in admitting at the combine last month that he was wrong in his beliefs, shifted his philosophies when it has come to the free agency part of roster building, an aspect that Gettleman hasn’t excelled in his role as the Giants general manager.

So he made some changes, the biggest of which start with who he gave big-money contracts. In his first two seasons as general manager, Gettleman signed veterans who were at least 30 by the time the season started such as linebacker Connor Barwin (32), left tackle Nate Solder (30), guard John Greco (32), receiver Golden Tate (31), safety Antoine Bethea (35), and right tackle Mike Remmers (30).

With age comes the potential of skill decline, which is what the Giants found out the hard way. As of this writing, only Solder and Tate remain on the roster, and the likelihood of them being on this roster beyond 2020 is slim.

Gettleman has instead switched his thinking and has mostly pursued younger veterans for critical roles who are just starting to enter their prime. 

Instead of giving them four or more year contracts, he instead switched to three-year deals as the max, meaning that all the players can re-enter free agency again before they reach age 30.

By switching to shorter contracts, the Giants also finally joined some of the league’s top teams at managing the salary cap. They have abandoned the cap-choking signing bonus in favor of the much friendlier roster bonus.

The difference between a signing bonus and a roster bonus is that the former can be spread out over the life of a contract up to five years while the latter is only counted against the year in which it’s paid out.

For example, a player with a cap number of $14 million broken down to a $4 million base salary and $10 million in a roster bonus becomes a lot easier to cut with no dead money assuming his contract is terminated before the date his roster bonus is due. 

On the contrary, a player whose $14 million cap hit consists of a $7 million base salary and $7 million prorated from the signing bonus against the cap is harder to cut if he has multiple years left because of the potential acceleration of the prorated amount of the signing bonus.

To illustrate, when Odell Beckham Jr was traded last year, the Giants were hit with a $16 million dead money cap hit, which was the acceleration of Beckham’s remaining prorated bonus. Even if they had designated him a post-June 1 transaction, which would have lessened their dead money for 2019, they still would have been charged $12 million in dead money against the 2020 cap.

By going the route of the roster bonus, the Giants have set themselves up to where they should have space when quarterback Daniel Jones and running back Saquon Barkley are ready for their next contracts.