Tracking the massive cap hits of the Detroit Lions’ top-7 core players

With the signing of Aidan Hutchinson’s four-year, $180 million extension this week, the Detroit Lions now have seven core players locked up through the 2028 season. Here are the recent contract extensions each of them has signed:

• QB Jared Goff: four years, $212 million
• WR Amon-Ra St. Brown: four years, $120 million
• WR Jameson Williams: three years, $83 million
• RT Penei Sewell: four years, $112 million
• DT Alim McNeill: four years, $97 million
• EDGE Aidan Hutchinson: four years, $180 million
• S Kerby Joseph: four years, $84.1 million

While there are certainly some big extensions to come in the following years, I want to focus on these seven contracts for now and highlight just how difficult the job of Lions general manager Brad Holmes will be moving forward. Currently, these seven players account for a total $84,830,616 in cap space for the 2025 season. That is just a tad over 31% of the team’s entire salary cap.

However, when some of these extensions hit a big salary jump, these players will soon take over the majority of Detroit’s cap hit. Using OverTheCap’s estimated NFL salary cap in future years—and the initially reported numbers of Hutchinson’s new deal—here’s what this core seven’s cap hit will look like over the next three seasons.

Next year, three players take a massive jump in cap hit:

• Jared Goff goes from $32.6 million to $69.6 million
• Amon-Ra St. Brown goes from $13.91 million to $33.11 million
• Penei Sewell goes from $9.54 million to $28 million

As a result, the core seven’s cap hit jumps from 31.5% to 62.2%.

Now, here’s the good news: those seven players won’t actually take up over 60 percent of the team’s salary cap next year. Detroit can immediately drop Goff’s massive cap hit next year by taking nearly all of that $55 million salary and turning it into a signing bonus that is prorated over the next five years. That could drop his cap hit by around $40 million, and there’s a pretty good chance the Lions will do exactly that. The Lions could take a similar measure with Sewell’s $19.9 million salary (could clear up around $15M) or St. Brown’s $27.5 million salary (could clear up around $20M). Because those players are expected to be around for the next five years minimum, there is little risk in kicking that cap hit further down the road when the salary cap is expected to grow. Kicking the can down the road is only a dangerous strategy if you’re forced to cut ties with those players early. In many of the core seven’s cases, they could be signing another extension in Detroit in four years, which would only help in maintaining cost-effective cap hits down the line.

Still, the charts above highlight how “easy” Holmes has had it so far. Even with maximum restructures for Goff, Sewell, and St. Brown next year, the seven would take up around 37% of the cap—a significant...