Although no teams have used it yet, the franchise’s tag window opened a week ago and runs through March 9. There is usually a flurry of tagging activities as the deadline approaches.
The Pittsburgh Steelers scored external linebacker Bud Dupree on the 2020 deadline in hopes of reaching a long-term deal. As we know, this did not happen and, in all likelihood, Dupree will be with a different team in 2021.
The franchise tag numbers for each position are based on the 2021 salary cap and that final number is still unknown. Teams are told that it will not fall below $ 180 million – a far cry from the $ 198.2 threshold in 2020 – so they are just making an estimate at this point, which may be why some teams are hesitant to use the tag.
By OverTheCap, the value of the linebacker is projected to be $ 15.65 million and the value of the wide receiver to be $ 16.43 million. If Pittsburgh scores Dupree for the second consecutive season, his number will be considerably higher than the projected one-year auction.
Clubs must pay 120 percent of the player’s previous salary to mark a player for two consecutive years. Based on his $ 15.8 million salary in 2020, Dupree would be paid $ 18.96 million for one season.
Many clubs, including the Steelers, are in the red. They will be fighting until the final hour to meet the limit by the beginning of March 17 of the new year of the league. This is not to say that general manager Kevin Colbert and his team were distributing money left and right. Good teams will always face this, because they pay the best talents for what they are worth and often try to retain them. No one could have predicted that a global pandemic would trigger the limit.
So, of Pittsburgh’s 25 outstanding free agents, who is likely to receive the franchise brand designation? There is no doubt that Dupree and the wide receiver JuJu Smith-Schuster are high priority free agents that the Steelers would keep if they could.
If they could are the keywords here – because it looks like can not. “I would say it is doubtful whether we will be able to use a tag,” Colbert said in a recent Pittsburgh media call.
“Again, when we say we don’t know what the limit is, what we try to do is prepare for the worst situation. At the moment, we know that the limit cannot be below $ 175 million under the CBA. Therefore, we will always work with that mentality. We are going to play different scenarios and set up different scenarios in the event we are dealing with. “