Denver Broncos: Predicting a Possible Justin Simmons Contract

Broncos cap situation

From a cap perspective, the Broncos are in really good shape this year, with still around $17 million in cap space available (although they still do need to sign the draft class, so realistically a bit less), but that space is with an $11.4 million cap hit for Simmons already on the tag figure.

There are generally two reasons to give a player a large signing bonus—first money upfront is always better than money later, and second is to lower the year 1 cap hit.  The larger signing bonus upfront also means that cap hits in the outer years of the deal will be higher as the figure is accounted for partially in later years.

The Broncos don’t necessarily need to lower the year one cap hit and can actually afford to higher if needed to keep the cap hits in the outer years lower when other young players need new deals.  With this said, a reasonable signing bonus would be in the $10 million range, much like Mahomes deal, in order to give Justin some up-front money without killing the future cap hits.

A very reasonable estimation on a cash flow/cap hits on a year to year basis would be as follows:

As detailed in the table, the Broncos would take the largest cap hit in year two, prior to players like Courtland Sutton, Drew Lock, and Bradley Chubb needing their own paydays.  The last two years of the contract would likely be structured to be non-guaranteed in the event that his play drops off, or they need to execute a restructure to give them cap flexibility.