Breaking Down Marquise ‘Hollywood’ Brown’s One-Year Contract with the KC Chiefs

Details for Brown's Chiefs deal are out, including which incentive benchmarks he'll have to hit to earn his maximum mark in 2024-25.

The Kansas City Chiefs officially have their big-time wide receiver splash in the books, as Marquise "Hollywood" Brown signed with them on Monday afternoon. The 26-year-old is on an affordable one-year pact, allowing him to chase a championship and affording Kansas City the ability to remain under the salary cap line.

With that said, there are some caveats to the deal. Brown has up to $4 million in earnable incentives, which would impact cap space if he hits them. Those incentives can be broken down into likely to be earned (LTBE) and not likely to be earned (NLTBE) and are based on the prior season's performance.

Additionally, the Chiefs find themselves in a far-from-perfect spot financially despite having enough money to sign Brown. What are the details of Brown's deal, and how do they impact the cap sheet for the rest of the offseason? Let's take a look. 

Salary and incentive details for Marquise Brown in Kansas City

Albert Breer of Sports Illustrated posted a breakdown of Brown's contract on X. It contains $3M at signing, as well as $3.5M in a guaranteed base salary and $250,000 each in total per-game roster bonuses and a workout bonus. That makes up his $7M baseline for the 2024 contract year. $6.5M is fully guaranteed. 

Brown's incentives are where he can cash in on some serious funds:

• Touchdowns: $500,000 for five, $750,000 for six, $1M for seven are all NLTBE incentives.
• Receiving yards: $500,000 for 500 is LTBE. $625,000 for 625, $750,000 for 750 and $1.5M for 1,000 are all NLTBE incentives.
• Playing time: $500,000 for 45%, $625,000 for 52.5%, $750,000 for 60% are all LTBE incentives. $1.5M for 75% is NLTBE.

The $4M in maximum earnings via incentives is pretty straightforward. If Brown has a season in which he plays at least 75% of available snaps, has 1,000 receiving yards and scores seven touchdowns, he'll hit that ceiling. There are multiple other combinations for him to soar above his $7M base amount, largely due to the LTBE incentives.

This past season, Brown played in just over 69% of the Cardinals' regular-season snaps and had 574 receiving yards and four touchdowns. As a result, his LTBE incentives for 2024 are the first three playing time totals and the 500-yard receiving mark. The $750,000 in earnings for 60% of snaps and $500,000 for 500 yards, in turn, will count against this year's salary cap. Brown's cap hit stands at right around $8.2M as-is.

Should brown cash in on his NLTBE incentives, those figures will count against the following league year's salary cap. 

Where does the Chiefs' salary cap situation stand now?

After accounting for Brown's contract going on the docket, the Chiefs are operating on somewhat thin ice from a salary cap perspective. Tuesday cap space estimates from OverTheCap and Spotrac check in at $7.6M and $8.5M, respectively. Considering there's a lack of quality depth at positions such as wide receiver, defensive end, running back and elsewhere, more space might be needed. Once a rookie class from the 2024 NFL Draft is added to the picture, things become even trickier.

If general manager Brett Veach and his staff want to create more space, they have a few options. While quarterback Patrick Mahomes's contract has already been restructured, his teammates can help. Extensions to tight end Travis Kelce and Justin Reid, first and foremost, are less likely but still possible. More likely or practical levers to pull would be restructuring the contracts of either left guard Joe Thuney or right tackle Jawaan Taylor.

The Chiefs have $7.5m in salary cap space and need ~$2.8m of that space for rookies.

If they wanna do basically anything...cap space will need to be created.

— Conner Christopherson (@Conner_DKC) March 19, 2024

Hollywood Brown Is a Tremendous Fit with the Chiefs