If all goes well with his physical, tackle Levi Brown will be a member of the Pittsburgh Steelers later on today and the team will need to accommodate his $3.63 million cap charge being as they only had a little more than $1.858 million in cap space to work with to start the day.
Early reports are indicating that there were no other players involved in the deal. However, if running back Isaac Redman were to wind up being part of it, that would only clear a little less than $1 million in cap space as he has already been on the roster for four weeks.
Being as Brown currently has no guaranteed money that has to be accounted for through 2016, the Steelers could possibly turn $2.63 million of his base salary into a signing bonus and that would lower his cap charge down to $1.6575 million. In doing so, they would be kicking $1,972,500 in potential dead money down the road to future years.
Safety Troy Polamalu and cornerback Ike Taylor are both under contract for 2014, so they could also be restructure candidates at some point, but by doing so, both will almost certainly have to be on the roster next season.
The Steelers could also give one year extensions to either safety Ryan Clark and defensive end Brett Keisel in order to free up a little more cap space, but based on their ages and the little amount that would save, that wouldn’t be advisable.
When the dust clears, I think you will see Brown’s contract restructured and perhaps a player or two released.
