Salary Cap Implications of Veron: Someone's gonna go.

While yesterday I talked about how the money for Veron didn't imply much of a trade-off, there is a trade that needs to be considered: Adding a designated player $400K to the salary cap. Ridge Mahoney talks a bit about this today, so let's look closer. $400K salary cap hit for a designated player. United doesn't have the room for that right now. Now, I don't have 2008 Salary figures, but I think we can take a good guess as to how things stand. Let's take the 2007 Base Salaries, and add 5% as a rough estimate for built-in contract increases, and we'll adjust for the departure of Brian Carroll and the anticipated retirement of Josh Gros:

I've left in North, Crowe, and Mupier since while they're gone, those salaries will also likely go to new draft picks. Now, to afford Veron's $400K salary hit, United would need to get to about $1.85M, and right now they're almost $150K over that number before any negotiations with Christian Gomez or others about raises. Given that I think there's no way we keep Christian without at least $50,000/year more, that means DCU is probably in a position where to keep Veron, plus Gomez, plus Moreno, they need to trim about $200K, or acquire allocations to help pay those salaries and keep us under the cap. Looking at the list, do you see where cuts can get made?

Yeah, there's Vanney. A salary renogitation has long been rumored, but even if you get him down $100,000, there's still another $100K you need to find somewhere. Now, in my mind, it would not surprise me to see Vanney's salary renegotiated, then see Vanney traded (getting him almost entirely off the books) for allocation money that would help us stay within the cap providing some money to help bolster the salaries of Gomez and Emilio (assuming we don't get the benefit of L.A. salary cap rules).

Of course, if either Moreno or Gomez leaves, then the situation is largely moot. And perhaps there are other people that we need to consider renegotiation with: As much as it hurts me to say it, Ben Olsen and Jaime Moreno are both getting a lot of money, and perhaps you can save some there. Of course, that means we'd be threatening the soul of United, and I can imagine how that would be perceived by hyperactive bloggers like me...