On Thursday, we heard that Pittsburgh Steelers quarterback Ben Roethlisberger is almost guaranteed to be back for an 18th season in 2021. So. with that huge item out of the way, now let’s wait to see if central veteran Maurkice Pouncey returns in 2021 along with Roethlisberger. according to the Thursday night report by Gerry Dulac of the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette, it certainly looks like there is a very good chance that Pouncey will be back in 2021 as well.
Dulac spoke with Roethlisberger’s agent, Ryan Tollner, on Thursday, and he gave a rumor about Pouncey when talking about his client’s return for the 2021 season.
Ryan Tollner: “Ben knows he still has more, but having important players back, like (Maurkice) Pouncey, will be important. Ben’s contract is not going to delay things. We told them immediately after the season that we would make all necessary adjustments to help with the 2021 cap situation. ”
– Gerry Dulac (@gerrydulac) January 28, 2021
“Ben knows he still has more, but having important players back, like (Maurkice) Pouncey, will be important,” Tollner told Dulac. “Ben’s contract is not going to delay things. We told them immediately after the season that we would make any necessary adjustments to help limit the situation in 2021. ”
So, does that guarantee that Pouncey will return to attack Roethlisberger in 2021? Absolutely not, but I don’t think it was an accident for Tollner to mention Pouncey’s name in his response the way he did. Hell, it makes sense that Roethlisberger wants Pouncey back for one last ride together. Personally, I will be shocked if Pouncey does not return with Roethlisberger for the 2021 season at this point.
So, what happens if Pouncey returns? To begin with, Pouncey is scheduled to earn $ 8 million in 2021, the last year of his contract and his maximum number is scheduled to be $ 14.475 million. Can the Steelers decrease that number as they plan to decrease Roethlisberger’s number in the next seven weeks? Of course they can, but for that they would probably need to do a nullable year extension with Pouncey, as they would probably do with Roethlisberger.
If they wanted to, and assuming Pouncey agreed, the Steelers could give Pouncey a four-year extension without any new money that is canceled right after the 2021 season. As part of that fake extension, $ 6.925 million of the $ salary 8 million Pouncey that he is due in 2021 would be transformed into a signature bonus and then prorated from 2021-2025. Such an extension would create $ 5.54 million in wage cap space for 2021.
So, the downside to doing this with the Pouncey contract? Well, to begin with, the rest of the contract would be canceled after the 2021 season and, in doing so, would create a $ 5.54 million dead money charge in 2022. If the Steelers also do a similar full annulable year extension with Roethlisberger as I established earlier, the team would save $ 14.34 million in 2021 salary cap space, but at the same time create a dead money charge in 2022 of $ 14.34 million. So doing Roethlisberger and Pouncey the way I just described would create almost $ 20 million in the 2021 salary cap, but it would also create a corresponding amount of dead money in 2022.
Once again, the beginning of the 2021 year of the NFL league begins on March 17 and that’s when teams need to comply with the salary cap. A few weeks earlier, we should know for sure whether Roethlisberger and Pouncey will be back for the 2021 season and, if so, what kind of changes have been made to their contracts and how much wage cap space has been created as a result of it all.