Baltimore Ravens restructure Jimmy Smith’s contract
By Joe Schiller
The Baltimore Ravens have opened up $5.15 million in cap space by restructuring the contract of cornerback Jimmy Smith.
The Baltimore Ravens came into today with the lowest remaining salary cap of any NFL team. That is not the case anymore. It was reported this morning that the Ravens have restructured cornerback Jimmy Smith’s contract.
Source: the Ravens converted $7.725M of CB Jimmy Smith's $8.5M base salary into a signing bonus, creating $5.15M in cap space.
— Field Yates (@FieldYates) August 10, 2017
The move essentially doubles the Ravens cap space. They now have close to $10.2 million to work with right now.
But of course, that money moved doesn’t just disappear. Thanks to Brian McFarland of Russell Street Report, he breaks the situation down. The $7.75 million moved adds to the cap in 2018 and 2019.
JimmySmith's restructure turned $7.75M of his $8.5M salary into a bonus to create $5.15M in Cap space. Adds $5.25M to his Cap # in '18 & '19 pic.twitter.com/hujj7oecZM
— Brian McFarland (@RavensSalaryCap) August 10, 2017
Smith, 29, is entering his 7th year in the league. He is currently under contract with the team until the 2020 season.
Injuries have been a problem in the past, but when on the field Smith has been one of the better corners in the league. After an offseason to recover from an ankle injury, Smith looks fully healthy. He’ll be the Ravens presumable No. 1 corner week 1 against the Bengals.
So now the burning question is: will the Ravens go out and sign someone?
It’s hard to say. It’s a possibility, but there’s no guarantee the Ravens do this. At the very least they opened up cap space to have some breathing room to operate during the season.
If the Ravens do go after another free agent, an offensive lineman would make the most sense. Even with the signing of Austin Howard, the Ravens could still use more depth on the offensive line. Center seems like the biggest need right now. Two potential free agent options in Nick Mangold and former Raven Jeremy Zuttah are available, but it’s whether they are better than Ryan Jensen at this point. I’d like to see what Jensen can do before making any kind of decision.
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But as we know, you can never count out Ozzie Newsome. He always seems to be up to something and it wouldn’t be surprising to see the Ravens bring in one more free agent before the start of the season.