ENGLEWOOD, Colo. — Sean Payton walked through a Denver Broncos practice flanked by a near-complete starter group from last season’s 14-3 team and the franchise’s new $175 million, 205,000-square-foot headquarters, set to open later this month. The club also added receiver Jaylen Waddle. The coach credited the team’s improved financial position after the then-record $85 million dead-money hit from Russell Wilson’s 2024 release came off the books. “It feels good,” Payton said. “It’s important. It’s hard to do that.”
The Broncos enter the summer with the NFL’s second-lowest dead-money charges at about $3.4 million, $2.16 million of that tied to the offseason release of linebacker Dre Greenlaw. Only the Super Bowl champion Seattle Seahawks carried less dead cap. The previous historic charge did not derail Denver on the field; the team went 24-10 across the two seasons that followed Wilson’s release, snapped an eight-year playoff drought, made two postseason appearances and advanced to the AFC Championship Game in January.
The Broncos’ ability to navigate a major dead-cap burden has been cited as a possible example for other clubs. In a recent informal survey of 11 coaches and personnel executives, many respondents told ESPN that Miami’s more sweeping offseason cap moves appeared to be a progression of Denver’s approach. The Dolphins absorbed a new-record $179 million in dead-cap charges, including $99.2 million related to the release of quarterback Tua Tagovailoa, $55.4 million of which will hit this year’s cap. An NFC general manager told ESPN, “I do think [the Broncos] got everybody to kind of think you could rip the tape off if you really had to and you could work through it and it didn’t always have to be this long road back.”
Denver released Wilson as the 2024 NFL combine ended, after evaluating Oregon quarterback Bo Nix. The move generated a $53 million charge against the 2024 salary cap, equal to about 20.75 percent of Denver’s cap that year, and a $32 million hit in 2025. The transaction left the ownership group with one of the smaller operating budgets among NFL teams.
The Broncos also accumulated dead money from cuts to Randy Gregory ($7.13 million), Tim Patrick ($6.14 million) and Justin Simmons ($3.75 million). In total, Denver carried a league-leading $89.1 million in dead-money charges against a $255.4 million salary cap, with 13 former players creating dead-cap charges exceeding $1 million. Team decision-makers, including owner and CEO Greg Penner, reportedly agreed on the moves.
