Has this ever happened before in the history of the NFL?

[cowboycolors]

While this might be embarrassing to the organization, it's really not that big a deal. All teams/GMs know that not all 53 players dress every week. If you don't have enough cap space in the last week of the season to pay for all of the extra players to stand on the sidelines and watch, nobody really notices/cares.

Agreed it’s not like they are a professional organization or anything. Just let the poor giants get it over with and get to those tee times

 

[Manster7588]

Funny story, but sadly it's not true.

Per this it is.

Giants Don't Have Enough Cap Space To Carry A Full 53-Man Roster Into Final Game Of Season

The New York Giants a dumpster fire organization and nothing sums that up more than this. The Giants, who currently sit at 4-12 and in last place in the NFC East, are entering their Week 18 game against the Washington Football Team without having a full 53-man roster and it’s not because of...

dailysnark.com

 

[fknhippie]

I thought you had to be at/under the cap before the season started and it was a non-issue until the next off-season.

 

[fastforward]

NFL minimum pay in 2021 is $660K for the 18 week season. That works out to $36,667 per week. PS pay is about $10K per week. The Giants have enough cap space to add players to the 53-man roster for 1 week. If they were really hard up they could move rookies from the PS to the active roster, (or cut some not needed PS players). The point is the Giants know who they're going to have as their 48-man game day roster and they can bring up 2 PS players at the last minute if they need to. There's no need to pay guys who aren't going to be on the game day roster an extra $26.667 without a good reason. I'm sure the Giants could restructure a contract to give themselves more space if they needed to. For reference the Rams restructured Aaron Donald's contract AFTER the final game a year or 2 ago so they'd have extra cap space prior to the end of season. Beyond that the 'hard cap' isn't in fact a hard cap. Teams can go over, (but the league could theoretically punish them).

The Giants have $250K+ in cap space. They could sign multiple players for 1 game. They're just being a clown show cheap. It's a fun story, but there's a reason it's not mentioned on NFL.com, ESPN, FOX, ABC, NBC...

 

[fastforward]

I thought you had to be at/under the cap before the season started and it was a non-issue until the next off-season.

It's checked on a very regular basis. If it wasn't a team could be under in March but $150M over for the rest of the season.

 

[Tainthappening]

Wow... what a mess.

This cap site supports the story... NYG only 49 players on active roster and $2.9M of cap space

NYG_cap_space

Peaked at 2022... 43 players and $2.7M of cap space