Recent Eagles salary cap update may be cause for slight concern

As weeks pass and the pages of the calendar are turned from one month to another, the Philadelphia Eagles remain a constant topic. The same is true for the best at his profession in this business we call football.

Some say no one does his job better than Howie Roseman. Others say he's overrated. Those aren't the only opinions on the subject. As Bill Barnwell so eloquently expressed recently, there's a chance that both arguments are reasonable.

Howie wears many hats for our Eagles. His title? ... Vice President and General Manager. We often diminish the job description of the latter title to a handful of responsibilities:

Draft well... Sign free agents... Extend the best players when their numbers come up... Manage the salary cap... That's where our current story begins.

There's a constant line that GMs toe. Making the most of 'right now' sits on one side. Long-term planning sits on the other.

The Eagles have the most future salary cap debt in the NFL, and the Saints aren't even a close second.

Who remembers that first credit card? It sure was fun for a while, wasn't it? Everything seemingly fell apart and our fantasy took and unexpected turn when the first bill came in the mail.

Something is afoot. Philly owns the most future salary cap debt in the NFL. They're well over $300 million. The team ranking second, the New Orleans Saints, aren't even a close second. We believe we knew this. The thought may have crossed our minds once, but there's something about seeing something as opposed to thinking something.

Thank Chris Kouffman for piecing the list together. Here's a look at where everyone lands.

On the surface, that might be a tad frightening. Still, somewhere, wherever he is, we believe Howie is on top of things and this isn't a thought that's lost on him. So, we rely on his reputation. He'll handle his business, but we can't profess to explain how verbally or in text.

There have been different descriptions of Howie Roseman's method of maneuvering the Eagles salary cap. Some call what he does 'genius'. Others say he kicks the can down the road. Frankly, we aren't sure which explanation holds more credence. That's why he's the GM and why we aren't.

We'd never profess to tell you that we could do Howie's job better than he can. We can only offer you a guess. Maybe our guy is banking on that ever-increasing cap.

NFL teams were only permitted to spend $182.5 million on player salaries in 2021 because of a COVID-19-affected season. Since then, the cap rose almost $26 million in 2022, $16.6 million in 2023, and $30.6 million in 2024.

If that trend continues, we probably won't notice what now seems like massive hits. We've been down this road before. Things always work out. It's 'Howie Season', and that never ends.

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