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INDIANAPOLIS – The Giants asked receiver Sterling Shepard to take a significant pay cut in order to return on a shortened one-year contract next season, according to a league source.
As he recovers from a torn Achilles suffered in December, Shepard is scheduled to count an unmanageable $12.495 million against the salary cap. The Giants could save $4.505 million by cutting him and adding $7.99 million in dead cap.
It is unclear exactly how much Shepard, 29, was asked to reduce his salary from $8.475 million, but it is expected to be close to the league minimum for a player with six years of service time ($1.035 million). Shepard has two years remaining on his deal, but players who accept pay cuts often want to reach free agency sooner as a trade-off, on the hope of recouping lost wages.
Shepard is said to be consider ing the pay cut as he ponders his options. It is possible he could be ready to go for the start of the regular season, but he is unlikely to be available for spring camp.
General manager Joe Schoen said earlier this week that navigating the Giants’ unhealthy cap situation involved many contingency plans. That was a reference to getting players to accept pay cuts and working out trades so as not to totally gut the top-end talent.
The Giants signed Shepard to a four-year, $41 million extension in April 2019 – shortly after trading Odell Beckham Jr. – but changed the cash flow last season by restructuring his deal to create more cap space in dire times. They turned nearly $6 million of his salary into a signing bonus that created $4 million in space and was supposed to make it more financially difficult to cut Shepard.
But then came Shepard’s latest injury-plagued season, the Giants’ latest regime change and the plan to get out from being $12 million over the cap to as much as $40 million under it without kicking the can down the road through more restructures.
Shepard is the longest-tenured member of the Giants and the only one who has appeared in a playoff game for the team. He remains quarterback Daniel Jones’ favorite target when healthy – he had 16 catches for 207 yards and one touchdown through the first two games of last season before pulling a hamstring – but he has missed 20 games since 2019 due to various injuries.
The Giants cut tight end Kyle Rudolph and running back Devontae Booker on Wednesday to free up $7.1 million in cap space.
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