Bills among NFL executives over guaranteed future salary despite offseason shakeup

Fielding a consistently competitive NFL team obviously costs a lot of money.

The Buffalo Bills, despite an offseason shakeup that saw the team move on from several loyal starters in an attempt to partially reset its on-field and financial clocks, are still tied to a significant amount of guaranteed salary in the immediate future and in the future. road. OverTheCap founder Jason Fitzgerald recently shared a list of teams responsible for the most future fully guaranteed salary (despite unsigned quarterbacks and draft picks), providing insight into the health of teams’ salary caps starting in 2025. The Bills have $66,140,530 guaranteed to non-quarterbacks for the 2025 season and beyond, the seventh-most in the NFL.

Left tackle Dion Dawkins takes on the largest share of Buffalo’s future guarantees, as he is guaranteed $17,045,000 in 2025, per OTC. Gregory Rousseau also eats up a substantial percentage of the number, as his recently activated fifth-year option will see the defensive end earn $13,387,000 fully guaranteed in 2025. Other non-quarterbacks on Buffalo’s roster who have guaranteed money in 2025 and beyond, according to OTC, are DT Ed Oliver, CB Taron Johnson, TE Dawson Knox, DT Daquan Jones, CB Kaiir Elam, WR Curtis Samuel and TE Dalton Kincaid; their guarantees range from $1.9 million to $8.25 million.

According to OTC, Kincaid is the only player on the Bills roster currently guaranteed money beyond the 2025 season; he is guaranteed $2,580,960 in 2026, the third year of his rookie contract.

Buffalo has $66 million guaranteed to non-quarterbacks after next season does not that means the team should have over $200 million in available cap space in 2025; just because money/salary isn’t guaranteed doesn’t mean a team isn’t tied to it. The Bills currently have 25 contracts outstanding for the 2025 campaign that carry no guaranteed money, per OTC, but they still count against the team’s payroll and salary cap. Buffalo has a total of 35 players currently under contract for 2025 and is expected to have a cap hit of around $13 million.

Related: Brandon Beane speaks out on the Bills’ dire salary cap situation

These numbers can, and likely will, change significantly between now and 2025 as Buffalo restructures or extends pre-existing contracts, potentially securing new funds along the way.

Either way, the list is an interesting way by which we can see the health of the Bills’ cap compared to the rest of the league. Topping the list are the Philadelphia Eagles, with WR AJ Brown, OT Jordan Mailata and DE Bryce Huff taking up the largest share of the team’s $119,566,947 guaranteed salary. The Jacksonville Jaguars and New York Giants occupy the second and third spots, with DE Josh Allen and DE Brian Burns being their respective players with the most future guaranteed salary tied to them.