Roster Limits/Salary Cap

Roster Limits
A respective team can carry a maximum of 60 players on their roster (used to be 53) at any given time during the season and post-season. However, rosters are divided into two sub-groups; Active and Inactive. A maximum of 46 players can be designated to the Active Roster throughout the season and off-season. These are the player who will ‘dress’ for game days – meaning these players will be allowed to play in the games. This leaves an additional 14 players who are assigned to the Inactive Roster. Players on the Inactive Roster do not ‘dress’ for games and will not be played when the games are simulated, there are two exceptions. Being the emergency QB if the need arises and having a 46 player or smaller active roster. With a small roster, even players on the inactive list may get into the game.

During the off-season the maximum number of players a team can carry increases from 60 to 80. This allows teams to stockpile talent on their teams, and provides the team flexibility to see how well a wider range of players perform during pre-season games if the owner of the team chooses to do so. In this case players from the Active and Inactive Rosters will dress for game days. However, to ensure the players on the Inactive Roster play in the pre-season games it is recommended that you place those players on the pre-season depth chart which can be located through the following drop down boxes: My Teams -> Inset Team Name Here -> Coaches Corner -> Off/Def Depth Chart Preseason.

Salary Cap
Understanding the Salary Cap is one of the most important aspects of becoming a successful coach in DeepRoute. To new users this could potentially be very daunting, however with some initial education the process of maintaining your cap is not too difficult to manage. The Salary Cap is the amount of money a respective team has to spend on players. All teams have a Salary Cap of $130,000,000.

Each respective team’s Salary Cap information can be found on the Roster Moves page. This page can be located through the following drop down boxes: My Teams -> Insert Team Name Here -> General Manager -> Roster Moves/IR, or by going to any of your team pages and clicking the "Roster Moves" link in the bar below your team name. Below is a picture of the Salary Cap Management Console.



Current and Future Salary Cap Situations
This shows you the sum of all your currently contracted players for the next seven years. This also includes any "Dead Cap" money (explained below). For the current year (in this example, 2045), your team must be under the Salary Cap whenever your roster limit is 60 players (this is during the regular season, playoffs, and End of Season spins). If you are over the cap at any of these points, the computer will make cuts to get you under the salary cap and you will no longer be able to sign any players who require bonus money for the remainder of the season. The future years shown on this page can be used to give you a good idea of how much money you have already promised to your current players for future years. This provides the user a quick way to determine and plan current and future signings or re-signings based on the salary cap available for those years.

Dead Cap
Dead cap is the bonus money owed to players whom are no longer on your roster. This money counts against your team’s overall Salary Cap. It also includes any bonus money of contracts you have decided to renegotiate. Dead Cap money will be accrued if you cut a player, trade a player, or renegotiate a contract with a player that still has bonus money due to him. In these cases, his entire bonus amount will count against your salary cap in the form of "dead cap". Depending on when the action occurs, the bonus money of the player will count as dead cap entirely for the current year (if the action occurs during Free Agency, Spin 1 and 2, Draft Day!, and/or Pre-June 1st), or his current years bonus will count toward the current year dead cap and all future year bonuses will count toward the next year (if the action occurs at any other time of the year). 

For example, I have a Defensive End who has not performed to my liking. I would like to cut this player, but he has 5 years remaining on his current contract. Through those 5 years he is slated to make $10,000 in bonus money each year. Since bonus money is guaranteed I must pay the players bonus money, totaling $50,000 ($10,000 X 5 years remaining on contract), regardless of when I cut him. If I cut the player after the prior seasons End of Season spin, but before the Post-June 1st Iteration (i.e. Free Agency, Spin 1 and 2, Draft Day!, and/or Pre-June 1st), then the $50,000 dead cap will be placed entirely on the current year. However, if I cut the player at any other time only $10,000 of the remaining $50,000 will be designated as dead cap for the current year, and the remaining $40,000 will be designated as dead cap for the following year. 

There is one exception to the rule of bonus money always being guarenteed: rookie contracts. For the two spins between the draft and your first preseason game (June  1 st  and Preseason 1/4) you can cut rookie draft selections without incuring any bonus money. These players will show a cut cost of zero on the roster moves page.

It is important to note that Dead Cap money includes bonus money ONLY. The base salary is NEVER counted against the dead cap.

Also note that the Dead Cap is already included in your teams total salary, and does not need to be added on. So if the team salary for your current season is $129M but you have $15M in dead cap, you are still $1M under the cap, not $14M over.

Salary Cap Ramifications of a Particular Player
When you click on a player, his contract situation will also show up on the screen. In this example, QB Christopher Sasser currently has 5 years remaining on his contract. The base salary (non-guaranteed) and bonus salary (guaranteed) are clearly labeled, as well as the total base and bonus salary. This provides a quick and easy way for users to view the contracts their players are currently bound to. This graph is also useful as it provides the user with a quick way to determine how much it would cost to cut the current player selected.

In the example above it is clearly indicated that it would create $7,050,000 (the 2045 bonus money) of dead cap that would count against the current year’s Salary Cap to cut Sasser. Additionally, it would create $28,200,000 ($7,050,000 bonus X 4 years remaining on contract) in dead cap space that would count against the following year’s Salary Cap.

