How the Detroit Lions can add over $20 million in cap space for 2023
The Detroit Lions aren’t in a bad position right now, but here’s how they can add more than $20 million in 2023 salary cap space.
As we sit right now, the Detroit Lions are in a pretty good spot. Coming off a winning season, they have four picks in the top-60 of April’s draft and they are in the top half of the league in cap space (numbers as of Jan. 21).
Over The Cap: $15,050,618 in cap space (12th-most in the league)
Spotrac: $18,109,106 in cap space (11th-most in the league)
Having such a young roster, as a roster build continues toward a third season under general manager Brad Holmes and head coach Dan Campbell, means the Lions just don’t have a lot of older players (one over 30 years old, Michael Brockers). And thus, naturally, they have very few bad or bloated contracts weighing down their books.
The Lions dead money situation, which was not great the last couple years after trading Matthew Stafford and cutting Trey Flowers, has cleaned up rather nicely. According to Over The Cap, they have $304,552 in dead money on the 2023 books right now. At a glance, that’s one of the 10 lowest dead money numbers in the league right now.
Since more is better than less, at least in this situation, here’s how the Lions can create more than $20 million in 2023 cap space.