What I wanted to do today was look at the current Dolphins roster and examine which players could potentially be cut this offseason in a roster purge by Bill Parcells, Jeff Ireland, and company. But first, one administrative note. I got my hands on the beta version of the new site that is expeted to roll out sometime in March (hopefully) and let me say this: wow! I think you'll all really like the new design and the new features. But now down to business.
The idea with this post is to look see which players could potentially be purged by the Dolphins and what the cap cost would be of cutting these players.
Below I've listed the players who, basically, aren't absolute locks to make the roster. And this includes potential trades where the Dolphins would still have to eat these players' cap costs.
The format below is the players name, followed by their 2008 cap cost. In parenthesis is how much cutting or trading that player would cost the Dolphins in cap space due to various things like prorated bonuses and the like. Also, all figures are in terms of millions of dollars. And be advised that these numbers are very close to the actual figure but may indeed be slightly off. Regardless, it paints a fairly accurate picture.
Offense
Trent Green: $3.733 ($0.666)
L.J. Shelton: $4.125 ($1.75)
Anthony Alabi: $0.559 ($0.039)
Joe Toledo: $0.445 ($0.218)
Marty Booker: $5.3 (0)
Derek Hagan: $0.622 ($0.354)
David Martin: $1.23 ($0.8)
Justin Peelle: $1.7 ($0.4)
Defense
Jason Taylor: $10.02 ($4.04)
Vonnie Holliday: $4.35 ($4.65)
Keith Traylor: $1.33 ($0.2)
Zach Thomas: $7.987 ($2.337)
Joey Porter: $7.4 ($9.6)
Andre Goodman: $2.033 ($0.333)
Travis Daniels: $0.635 ($0.115)
Jason Allen: $1.905 ($3.68)
Renaldo Hill: $2.567 ($0.667)
Cameron Worrell: $1.255 ($0.143)
So there's a simplified view of some of the decisions that lay ahead for this new regime.
My best bet to be cut, in terms of key players, is obviously Marty Booker. Since he was acquired in a trade, the Dolphins are not on the hook for any of his bonus money. Saving over $5 million is definitely worth it. We could use that money and put it towards bringing in somebody like Bernard Berrian, Jerry Porter, or Bryant Johnson.
Also, this shows that Zach Thomas and Jason Taylor, despite being loved by all of us, could easily be on the move out of Miami, financially speaking of course.
Thoughts below...