If the specialist pass rusher has a good year on the field, it could also be a good year for his savings account
The early Twitter reports on DE Von Miller’s contract with the Washington Commanders said that it was a one-year deal with a base value of $6.1m and a total value of up to $10m.
Over the Cap has now posted details of the deal.
You can see that Miller’s contract has 3 main components:
- Base salary of $1.995m (fully guaranteed)
- Signing bonus of $3m
- Per game roster bonuses amounting to $1.105m for 17 games ($65k per game)
Adding these three components together, indeed, gets us to the reported $6.1m.
Bonuses – likely to be earned vs unlikely to be earned
You’ll notice that OTC has Miller’s cap hit set at just $5.84m. The reason why the projected cap hit is not the full value of the contract is that the projection includes only bonuses deemed “likely to be earned” and excludes those deemed “unlikely to be earned”.
The distinction between the two is simple and is spelled out in the Collective Bargaining Agreement. To identify “likely to be earned bonuses”, the CBA looks to the prior year of play and includes any bonus that would have been earned, excluding any bonus that would not.
In this case, the $260,000 difference between the projected cap hit and the reported $6.1m is due to the fact that Miller played in only 13 games with Buffalo last season, not the full 17. At $65K per game, those 4 missed games would have cost him $260,000 in lost bonuses, which, this year with the Commanders, is the amount of Per Game Roster Bonuses deemed unlikely to be earned. Of course, if Miller is healthy and on the roster for the full 17 games, then he will receive the full $6.1m, all of which will count against the cap.
So, how does he get to $10m?
The reported contract value of “up to” $10m is reflected in the notes from OTC, meaning that Miller has an additional $3.9m of bonuses that the CBA deems “unlikely to be earned”.
We don’t know from the notes what the criteria are for Miller to earn that money, but given the fact that he is a specialist pass rusher, it seems reasonable to assume it relates to his cumulative sack total for the season. If that’s the case, then we know the threshold for earning the bonus is higher than the 6 sacks he produced in Buffalo a year ago because of their classification as “unlikely to be earned”.
Obviously, if Miller hits all the requirements to earn that additional $3.9m in incentives, his cap hit will rise to a whopping $10m, but he will probably have had the kind of impactful year that will help lead the team to success.
Estimated available cap space
With training camp now underway, Over the Cap estimates current available cap space at $16.85m. This is sufficient to allow for the signing of in-season injury replacements as needed, and will likely result in a rollover of around $10m to the 2026 season. Of course, the number can fluctuate greatly, as we are aware — for instance, available cap space will fall by about $4m if Von Miller is healthy for 17 games and earns all of his contract incentives in 2025.