The NFL announced the 2024 salary cap number on Friday and the $255.4 million per team came in way over the widely projected amount of $242.5 million. That’s obviously great news for the Pittsburgh Steelers as that means they are already under the 2024 salary cap number based on all offseason transactions until this point.
The Steelers recently re-signed exclusive rights free agent OT Dylan Cook to a one-year, $915,000 contract and with that, he has jumped into the updated Rule of 51. Additionally, the team terminated the contract of OC Mason Cole on Friday afternoon.
As previously posted, the Steelers are expected to roll over $2,340,191 in 2023 unused salary cap space. That now means that the Steelers’ adjusted salary cap number for 2024 should be $257,740,191.
The Steelers’ Rule of 51 number now sits at $248,734,346, and that includes $9,539,633 in dead money on the books for 2024. This means that the Steelers are now an estimated $9,005,845 under the cap as of Friday evening.
My number differs from various other hack Steelers blogs because I make sure to include forthcoming PPE (Proven Performance Escalator) raises. In fact, with the 2024 salary cap number set, we now know the amount of the raise that OT Dan Moore Jr. will receive in 2024 due to the PPE level for which he qualified.
With the Steelers now safely under the 2024 salary cap way ahead of the 2024 NFL year starting, it will be interesting to see other moves that might be made in the next several weeks.
As I have penned several times so far this offseason, the contract of WR Allen Robinson II remains a huge elephant in the room as we near the start of the 2024 league year with him set to earn $10 million as things stand here today. He will need to either take a massive pay cut or he’ll likely be cut by the middle of March.
Also as previously mentioned, the Steelers could also do something with DT Cameron Heyward’s contract in the coming weeks or months to lower his $22,406,250 cap charge for 2024. More than likely, Heyward will sign a two-year extension with no new money involved in 2024. Such a move could clear roughly $9.5 million in 2024 salary cap space.
The Steelers will also likely restructure the contract of OLB Alex Highsmith at some point during the offseason. A full restructuring, as I previously noted, would clear $7.206 million in 2024 salary cap space.
As I have stated numerous times these last few weeks, the Steelers have a few other players with March roster bonuses due that need monitoring moving forward. The remaining notable players who fit that classification are CB Patrick Peterson ($3 million), and DT Larry Ogunjobi ($4.75 million). The fact that the two have survived this long into the offseason might be a sign that they will each ultimately see their March roster bonuses. We shall see because there are still several weeks to go until then, and that’s a lot of time.
As usual, the attached table of salary cap data included in this post has projected expenses the team will need to account for moving way past the start of the new league year in March. I make sure to include it so that people are not surprised at a later date. The important number, at least for this Friday and looking forward to March and the start of the new league year, is the real-time number, which once again indicated the Steelers being $9,005,845 under a projected league-wide cap of $255.4 million.
