Players and their agents—really, teams as well—never want to frame a pay cut as such. It’s always just a contract restructure, even when that restructuring literally removes salary or other bonuses that were originally part of the deal.
That’s how members of the media, almost undoubtedly echoing an agent’s mass text message practically verbatim, initially described the pay cut that Cincinnati Bengals running back Joe Mixon accepted earlier this offseason. Some of it he can earn back through incentives, but he took less money to stay on the roster. He offered his reasons why yesterday.
“I see the bigger picture. I see the task at hand and what we’re trying to build and in order to keep other players here and pieces here, sometimes you have to sacrifice”, he told the team’s website, via Geoff Hobson. “I felt like this year was the year to sacrifice on the Super Bowl team we can potentially be”.
While it’s true that the Bengals should very much be Super Bowl contenders this season—after all, they have been the last two years and nothing has really changed for the worse since then—any potential championship victory won’t be due to the few million dollars they shaved off in 2023 cap space.
Mixon was due to earn $9.4 million in base salary. That was trimmed down to $6 million as a base with the potential to earn another $2 million via incentives (and then restructured to spread the cap hit out the way it’s conventionally done). Through other bonuses, his total 2023 compensation package would have reached $10.1 million. In all, he trimmed his base value in 2023 down by $4.67 million, as well as his 2024 compensation by $5.51 million, with only a portion of that potentially re-earned through incentives.
“That was my stance on it. We agreed on a number with great compensation this year with the incentives”, Mixon said. “Off my last deal, I feel like they allowed me to work to be able to make that money back. That’s cool. I’ll go work for it”.
The alternative, of course, was being released. You don’t approach a player about taking less money if you don’t have the leverage of releasing him if he doesn’t agree to it. And he was not coming off of his best season.
That came in 2021, the only year thus far in which he’s made the Pro Bowl. That season, he rushed for 1,205 yards with 13 touchdowns, adding another three receiving touchdowns. His nine scrimmage touchdowns last season did tie for the second-most of his career, but he has one of his least efficient seasons as a runner—even if his usage in the passing game increased with career highs in receptions and yards.
Mixon only just recently turned 27 years old as he moves into year seven so he still has a decent amount of tread left on his tires, so to speak. He does have 1545 career touches (1577 if you include the postseason).
