METAIRIE, Louisiana – At the last sign that Drew Brees is preparing to retire after 20 seasons, the New Orleans Saints quarterback has agreed to reduce his 2021 salary from $ 25 million to a minimum of $ 1.075 million for veterans, a source confirmed to ESPN on Friday.
The move will free up nearly $ 24 million in salary cap space for a Saints team that was designed to start off-season close to $ 100 million over the limit.
The deal was first reported by Over The Cap.
Brees, 42, has yet to announce whether he plans to officially retire. But the change had been widely expected for months. Saints coach Sean Payton said on Wednesday that he expected an announcement about Brees’s future plans within a week or two.
Brees and the saints would then wait until after June 1 to officially present their retirement paperwork so that they could distribute the remaining wage costs over the next two years. Brees was scheduled to post $ 36.15 million against the cap this season, with another $ 11.5 million “dead money” hit scheduled to count against the 2022 salary cap of previous signing bonuses.
Now he will count only $ 12.225 million against the limit as of June 1 – which would be reduced to $ 11.15 million after he officially retired. He would still count another $ 11.5 million against next year’s ceiling in this scenario, for a total of $ 22.65 million in dead money.
If Brees retires, he will emerge as the all-time leader of the NFL in career passing yards (80,358) and second in touchdown passes (571) and completion percentage (67.7%).