Gardner agrees to pay cut

http://www.charlotte.com/mld/charlotte/sports/football/nfl/carolina_panthers/12310929.htm


Down to $1 million from $2.1, and can still become a free agent after the year. Sounds good to me

 

Awesome.

 

A related story:

It's a good bet the Green Bay Packers will stand firm with nose tackle Grady Jackson, who is entering the final year of his contract and who suggested this week through his new agent, the ubiquitous Drew Rosenhaus, he might not report to camp without an extension. Fact is, the Packers don't have much choice. The NFL collective bargaining agreement stipulates that if a team makes an adjustment to a player's contract, it can't do anything to raise the cap value of the deal for 12 months. Since the Packers gave Jackson at least one advance on his base salary in recent months, there really isn't much they can do now.
http://sports.espn.go.com/nfl/columns/story?columnist=pasquarelli_len&id=2102598&num=0

So...does that mean the Panthers can't negotiate again with Gardner for 12 months? I'm sure if we'd want him back next year, the new cap hit would be for more than $1 million. 12 months from now he'll probably know who he's playing for.

 

His existing deal will expire at the end of the season so this rule will not affect us. It would only do so if he were under contract for next season as well.

 

Jackson's does too.

 

Then they can give him something once his current deal is up they just can not make any modifications to his current deal. I think that is the point of the article that nothing can happen right now.

 

That rocks - getting him at a reduced price without added years is a no - lose situation.

 

Only possible negative is that if he has a monster year, he'll command a better contract on the open market and be more expensive to sign.

 

Possible, sure. I think we were facing that anyway. I'd have been leery about spending on future years at a starter's salary without him having earned a start.

 

I'll take that risk.