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The Denver Broncos have some tough decisions coming up in terms of the roster and trying to create money for free agents and re-signing quality player — and all the while dealing with one last year of a massive dead cap hit of $38 million due to the disastrous Russell Wilson contract.
One way for the Broncos to create money where there currently is none would be to release players in salary cap moves, with Bleacher Report listing a pair of defensive players as the top 2 possible salary cap casualties for a team that just made the postseason for the first time in a decade.
Those 2 players were safety P.J. Locke ($5.2 million) and linebacker Alex Singleton ($6.9 million), who would free up approximately $10 million in salary cap space with a minimal dead cap hit of approximately $2 million.
From Bleacher Report: “P.J. Locke made his way from a reserve player to a full-time starter in 2024, but that wasn’t necessarily a good thing for the Broncos defense. He was often the weak link in pass coverage and gave up a passer rating of 125.8 when targeted … (Singleton) played well in the three games that he played this season and has been a fairly consistent starter in his first two seasons with the Broncos. The problem is that he’s a 31-year-old linebacker coming off an ACL tear.”
Locke Coming Off Career Year for Broncos
If the Broncos were to cut Locke, he would likely be able to find another home fairly quickly thanks to his experience. He’s coming off a career-high 15 starts in 2024 along with a career high 74 tackles.
Locke has spent his entire career with the Broncos after making the roster as an undrafted free agent out of Texas in 2020 after spending 2019 on Denver’s practice squad. Locke didn’t start a game his first 3 seasons and has made all 23 of his career starts over the last 2 seasons.
The problem with Locke is he just hasn’t been very good given a chance to get on the field for an extended period of time, with an anemic, 57.5 grade from PFF, ranking him 123rd out of 170 eligible NFL safeties.
Cutting Singleton Might be Tougher Decision
Despite his age, the Broncos might want to think twice about cutting Singleton, who signed a 3-year, $18 million contract in March 2023.
Singleton has been wildly productive over the last 4 seasons with the Philadelphia Eagles and Broncos, when he’s averaged 149.2 tackles per season and had a career high 177 tackles for the Broncos in 2023.
Through 3 games in 2024, Singleton was on track to equal that production and was finally going to get the chance to do on an elite team — he had 31 tackles through the first 3 games before his injury with 1 interception.
Singleton’s path to the NFL is one of the most unusual you’ll probably ever come across. He didn’t play in his first NFL regular season game until he was 26 years old after going undrafted out of Montana State in 2015. That’s because Singleton spent 2 seasons on the practice squads for the Minnesota Vikings, Seattle Seahawks and New England Patriots before playing 3 seasons in the CFL for the Calgary Stampeders.
Singleton was named CFL Most Outstanding Defensive Player in 2017 and led the Stampeders to the 2018 Grey Cup championship before making the active roster for the Eagles in 2019.
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