Jaguars Entering Final Phase of 2020 Offseason With Second-Most Dead Cap in NFL

The only team with more dead cap than the Jacksonville Jaguars? The Carolina Panthers.

With the NFL offseason inching to a close as the season awaits its beginning, team financials are being officially set for the 2020 season. With that comes an indication of how much dead cap teams are going to carry into the fall, and the Jacksonville Jaguars are among the leaders in the entire NFL in this regard.

According to Spotrac, the Jaguars currently have the second-most dead cap in the league for the 2020 season with $37,463,980, trailing only the Carolina Panthers ($41,117,805). 

The following teams that round out the top five are the Los Angeles Rams ($33,978,792), New England Patriots ($24,198,3060, and Miami Dolphins ($22,872,699). Tampa Bay has the least amount of dead cap with just $88,238.

Dead money is basically money from a team's cap space which has been guaranteed to a player formerly on a team who isn't on the club anymore, so a high dead cap figure shows a team is paying more money out to players who aren't even contributing to the team anymore. 

This is obviously no position a team wants to find itself in considering portions of its cap aren't being used on the on-field product, but this is where the Jaguars find themselves this season for a number of reasons. Below is how the Jaguars' astronomical dead cap figure is divided by player, per Spotrac.

• QB Nick Foles: $18,750,000 
• LB Telvin Smith: $5,620,470 
• CB A.J. Bouye: $4,000,000
• WR Marqise Lee: $3,500,000
• DL Calais Campbell: $2,500,000
• DT Marcell Dareus: $2,500,000
• LB Jake Ryan: $250,000
• TE Geoff Swaim: $250,000
• QB Alex McGough: $37,500
• WR Marcus Simms: $13,334 
• WR Tyre Brady: $3,334
• OT Donnell Greene: $3,334
• CB Picasso Nelson: $3,334
• CB Saivion Smith: $3,334
• OG Bunchy Stallings: $3,334
• LB Connor Strachan: $3,334
• WR Michael Walker: $3,334
• RB Brandon Watson: $3,334
• S Zedrick Woods: $3,334
• CB Tae Hayes: $2,667
• WR Dredrick Snelson: $2,000
• DT Michael Hughes: $1,668
• WR Raphael Leonard: $1,667
• DT Andrew Williams: $1,334

Clearly, the largest reason for the Jaguars' high dead cap figure is the looming number that is set to be paid out to ex-quarterback Nick Foles. Jacksonville signed Foles to a four-year, $88 million deal in March 2019 which included over $45 million in guaranteed money. 

When Jacksonville traded Foles to the Chicago Bears this March, they erased any financial commitments to him past 2020, but they took on the fourth-highest single-season dead cap for any player in NFL history. This isn't exactly new territory for the Jaguars in recent seasons, however. 

Entering the 2019 season, the Jaguars had the fourth-highest dead cap total with $36,328,954. The vast majority of this figure came from quarterback Blake Bortles, who the Jaguars released in 2019 one year after he signed a three-year contract with the team. Due to Bortles' release, the Jaguars were on the hook for $15,500,000 to give to the signal-caller to not play for them.

Among AFC South teams this year, the Indianapolis Colts have the 10th-lowest figure at $10,208,275, while the Houston Texans are at No. 13 with $10,299,598, and the Tennessee Titans are at No. 15 with $11,065,346.