Crosby, Amos Agree to Restructured Contracts

Void years were added to the contracts of kicker Mason Crosby and safety Adrian Amos to create additional cap space for 2020.

GREEN BAY, Wis. – The Green Bay Packers have restructured veteran kicker Mason Crosby’s contract, adding three void years to help create badly needed salary-cap space.

According to a source, that pushed Crosby’s 2021 cap number down from $4.5 million to $3.16 million. It was accomplished by reducing his base salary of $1.5 million to the league-minimum $1.075 million and eliminating a $1.25 million roster bonus. The restructure didn’t change Crosby’s cash flow; it merely changed the accounting.

To create the cap space for the upcoming season, which will help handle the re-signing on Kevin King, it turned the $425,000 of reduced base salary and the aforementioned roster bonus into $1.675 million of prorated signing bonus. That amount is spread in $335,000 installments over the 2021 and 2022 caps – his final two years under contract – and the three voided seasons.

That means the price of creating $1.34 million of cap space for 2021 is having a dead-money hit of $1.005 million on the 2023 cap when Crosby is no longer on the team. (That is the $335,000 proration multiplied by the three seasons).

At age 36 in 2020, Crosby made all 16 field-goal attempts and posted the second-best touchback rate of his career on kickoffs.

The Packers also restructured safety Adrian Amos’ contract. A couple weeks ago, the Packers turned his $1.5 million roster bonus into a signing bonus. That allowed the team to prorate that over the final two years of his contact and create $750,000 of cap relief. At the same time, according to a source, the team and Amos agreed to add two void years into the contract. (OverTheCap.com is reporting three void years.) Amos agreed to cut his $4.9 million base salary to the league-minimum $990,000.

The $3.91 million reduction in base salary and the elimination of the $1.5 million roster bonus adds up $5.41 million of signing bonus, which was prorated either over four years (two void years) or five years (three void years). Using OTC’s numbers with the three void years, Amos’ cap number went from a scheduled $10.3 million to $7.742 million, a reduction of $2.558 million.

As is the case with Crosby, the insertion of void years mean Amos will count against the salary cap in 2023 even when not on the roster. However, the new TV money is expected to impact the cap in 2023, making that easier to swallow.