PALM BEACH, Fla. — Now we can finally accurately judge the Eagles’ decision to bring back Derek Barnett.
Barnett’s two-year deal with the Eagles is worth up to $14 million. But you can also look at it as a one-year deal worth $5.5 million. The Eagles will have some flexibility to move on after 2022 if it doesn’t work out.
Even if Barnett plays through this two-year deal, his average per year comes out to $7 million, which ranks 37th in the NFL among edge players, according to OverTheCap.
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The Eagles are bringing Barnett back as a rotational player for their defense and they’re paying him like that.
“I think going into free agency, he probably thought a little differently about where he would be,” Eagles GM Howie Roseman said at the NFL owners meetings this week. “And for us, understanding that’s where he was thinking. It got to a point where it’s a huge priority to us to have a wave defensive line that’s really good. We know we can count on him. Obviously, it’s a position we want to continue to add to. We don’t want to make a strength a weakness.”
The Eagles also used voidable years to spread out the cap hits.
Here are some of the details of his contract by season:
NFL
2022
Salary: $4.5 million
(Base salary: $1.035m; advance $3.465m)
Per-game roster bonuses: $1 million
Cap hit: $2,669,176
2023
Salary: $7.5 million
(Base salary: $1.08m; option bonus $6.42m)
Per-game roster bonuses: $1 million
Cap hit: $4,057,000
The Eagles used a salary advance of $3.465 million that prorates over the course of five seasons and would use an option bonus of $6.42 million in 2023 that would also prorate for cap purposes. That’s why Barnett’s cap hits are so low the next two seasons.
Either way, Barnett’s first year of the contract in 2022 is worth $4.5 million in base salary with another $1 million in per-game roster bonuses (so up to $5.5 million). His second season is worth $7.5 million in base salary with another $1 million in per-game roster bonus (so up to $8.5 million).
If Barnett plays through the length of this contract, it will still leave just over $7.2 million in dead cap for the 2024 season. Roseman on Monday explained why he isn’t too worried about some of the Eagles’ large dead money figures.
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