Broncos roll over $17.788 million in 2020 cap room

In preparation for the 2021 offseason, the Denver Broncos have rolled over $17.778 million in cap room according to a report by Mike Klis of 9News. As Klis mentioned, this is not cap space but cap room. Meaning that whatever the cap is set at by the NFL, the Broncos will start with a higher ceiling by that amount they rolled over.

The 2021 salary cap was conservatively projected to be around $210 million before COVID-19 hit. The revenue shortfalls hit the NFL - as it did nearly every industry in 2020 - that had some estimates of the salary cap falling as low as $175 million.

Reports surfaced yesterday when Pro Football Talk reported that the a league source leaked that the 2021 salary cap could be closer to $180 million. That means the Broncos would end up somewhere closer to $200 million in cap room, which would give them plenty of ammunition in free agency.

Currently, the Broncos Top 51 according to Over The Cap is at $175 million. That’s without making any decisions on the roster heading into free agency. They could easily create much more cap room by cutting some key veterans. That means they could be looking at $23 million in cap space immediately, then after cuts that number could go much higher.

One thing that the PFT report also touched on was how bad this drop in salary cap is going to be for the “middle class” of the NFL. Teams with salary cap issues are likely going to be gutting their veteran starters who would fall under that “middle class” category of players, which would allow the Broncos to compete to fill out some key areas of position need without sacrificing cap space to do so.

The final cap number will be announced on March 17 when the new league year begins, but the real number will likely be leaked in the days ahead of that deadline.