The Khalil Mack trade is a reminder of the incredible value of having a quarterback on a rookie contract. The Chargers have Justin Herbert, giving them the ability to bolster other areas of their team with veterans like Mack.
The league re-worked the labor deal back in 2011, controlling the cost of incoming players. Gone are the days of handing out mega contracts to No. 1 overall picks like Sam Bradford and Matthew Stafford. Nowadays, rookies – even the first-rounders – are handed modest, slotted four-year deals.
So if a team can hit on a quarterback in the first round – Herbert, Patrick Mahomes, Josh Allen – it then gets a window where it can avoid paying much for the game’s most valuable position. That creates the opportunity to build a contender by using that money on other players. Like Mack.
Herbert is one of these guys. He accounted for only 3.2 percent of the Chargers’ cap space last year, and he’s still got two years left on that original four-year contract. That represents tremendous value, and that’s part of today’s game.
Consider, for example, Russell Wilson, who’s also now in the AFC West. You might argue that Wilson is as good or better than Herbert. But Wilson last year took up over 5 times as much cap space as Herbert. When you compare those guys, it’s not Wilson versus Herbert, it’s Wilson versus Herbert and the additional opportunities created by that rookie contract – Herbert comes with some extra notable players to help him out.
Mahomes and Allen have now signed big extensions, so they’re now moving out of the cost-controlled cap window. So you could argue that for the 2022 season, some or many teams would prefer to have Herbert – he’s also really good and comes with that extra cap space.
Seven quarterbacks last year accounted for over 11 percent of their team’s cap space last year, and none of them won playoff games. Four of them didn’t make the postseason. In fairness, Matthew Stafford (at 10.7 percent) won the whole thing.
| QUARTERBACKS: 2021 CAP SPACE | |
|---|---|
| Player | Pct |
| Russell Wilson | 17.5% |
| Kirk Cousins | 16.6% |
| Aaron Rodgers | 14.9% |
| Matt Ryan | 14.6% |
| Ben Roethlisberger | 13.9% |
| Derek Carr | 11.7% |
| Carson Wentz | 11.2% |
| Matthew Stafford | 10.7% |
| Dak Prescott | 8.2% |
| Tom Brady | 5.8% |
| Ryan Tannehill | 5.8% |
| Josh Allen | 5.4% |
| Jared Goff | 5.4% |
| Kyler Murray | 5.1% |
| Baker Mayfield | 5.0% |
| Joe Burrow | 4.2% |
| Patrick Mahomes | 4.0% |
| Daniel Jones | 3.9% |
| Justin Herbert | 3.2% |
| Trevor Lawrence | 3.2% |
| Justin Fields | 1.8% |
| Lamar Jackson | 1.7% |
| Mac Jones | 1.4% |
| Jalen Hurts | 0.7% |
The numbers in the charts here come from the website OverTheCap.com. With the salary cap changing each year, I went with percentage of the cap numbers rather than salary amounts.
In each of the last five years, a team benefitting from a rookie quarterback contract has made it to the Super Bowl. The Chargers are now one of the teams in that window of opportunity – hence the deal for Mack.
In the chart below, Matt Ryan stands out – by far the highest cap figure of these 22 quarterbacks. You can reasonably wonder if the Falcons would have won that game (which they lost in overtime) had his contract been structured differently, allowing them to obtain one more notable contributor.
When Seattle went to its last two Super Bowls, it was with Wilson not only on a rookie contract, but also being just a third-round pick – he cost essentially nothing. The Broncos aren’t getting that version of Wilson; they’re going to be paying him, and he’ll need a new deal next year.
| SUPER BOWL QUARTERBACKS | ||
|---|---|---|
| Year | Player | Pct |
| 2011 | Tom Brady | 11.0% |
| 2011 | Eli Manning | 11.7% |
| 2012 | Colin Kaepernick | 1.0% |
| 2012 | Joe Flacco | 6.6% |
| 2013 | Russell Wilson | .5% |
| 2013 | Peyton Manning | 12.5% |
| 2014 | Russell Wilson | .6% |
| 2014 | Tom Brady | 10.6% |
| 2015 | Cam Newton | 8.7% |
| 2015 | Peyton Manning | 11.7% |
| 2016 | Tom Brady | 8.6% |
| 2016 | Matt Ryan | 15.0% |
| 2017 | • Wentz + Foles | 4.3% |
| 2017 | Tom Brady | 8.3% |
| 2018 | • Jared Goff | 4.2% |
| 2018 | Tom Brady | 12.2% |
| 2019 | • Patrick Mahomes | 2.4% |
| 2019 | Jimmy Garoppolo | 8.6% |
| 2020 | • Patrick Mahomes | 2.4% |
| 2020 | Tom Brady | 12.2% |
| 2021 | • Joe Burrow | 4.2% |
| 2021 | Matthew Stafford | 10.7% |
—Ian Allan