New TV deal is huge for the Tennessee Titans free agency plans
By Will Lomas
It has been a tough week for Tennessee Titans fans that has frankly come at the end of an even tougher month.
Since there will be a seven-month stretch without any football games played, now is the time to enjoy that last bit of football, but there isn’t much joy in watching a Titans game this year.
Spare me the “You don’t remember how bad it was when the Tennessee Titans only won 5 games in two seasons.” line because that is exactly why there is no joy in watching this team. It hasn’t felt more hopeless to be a Titans fan since those days and this team is going to have to make some tough decisions this offseason if they want to stay at the top of the AFC South.
What makes it worse is that the one guy who knows how to actually do that in an offseason (Jon Robinson) is gone and there is no clear option to replace him. Combining that with Mike Vrabel seemingly ready to bring back Todd Downing and everyone on the strength and conditioning/medical team, it is hard to find the silver lining here.
This offseason is going to be crucial for the Tennessee Titans and it could mean the difference between being a Super Bowl contender or a team that is once again back to scrapping the bottom of the barrel.
One very positive note is that it seems like there will be more money to spend in free agency than everyone projected.
Tennessee Titans spending money
The expectation was that the 2023 salary cap would be $220 million, but a new TV deal between the NFL and Youtube should push that number up significantly.
While it won’t be a jump of tens of millions of dollars, sources in the NFL said that the expectation for the salary cap after this deal is that it would be “well above $220 million.”
As it stands right now, the Titans could create around $50 million in cap space just by moving on from Bud Dupree, Taylor Lewan, Ben Jones, Robert Woods, and Zach Cunningham. That doesn’t factor in cuts or restructures for guys that I think are key players with big contracts like Denico Autry who costs around $10 million in 2023 and Ryan Tannehill who makes $36 million next year.
The team isn’t going to fully rebuild next season, so that extra money from the TV deal could mean that the Titans can keep guys like Autry and Tannehill who they need on their roster to win games in 2023.