2026 cap number: $1,266,224 (R-4)<\/p>\n
I would have liked to drop $20 million-plus on at least one premium player at each position. I just couldn’t get around the fact of needing more than 15 players on the roster. Penei Sewell<\/a> ($28 million) was the most tempting potential luxury acquisition on the offensive line, but — and I hate to use language like this in a piece about spending to the limit — the savings opportunity with Garett Bolles made too much sense. For $20 million less, left tackle will be manned by a first-team All-Pro who registered the best pressures-allowed rate (5.9%) last season of any tackle with 500-plus pass-blocking snaps, per Next Gen Stats. Whether or not Tyler Smith stays inside or kicks outside<\/a> in 2026, he looks good here at left guard, matching Bolles with the best pressure rate allowed among guards (3.8%) to reach that play-time threshold — and hey, whaddaya know, Quinn Meinerz is two spots behind Smith (4.9%).<\/p>\n Luke Wattenberg’s cap hit doesn’t rise into the double digits until the final season of the extension he signed in November, and it’s at an especially sweet $3.6 million this year. So, again, though I would have really enjoyed picking the most expensive center available (Creed Humphrey<\/a>, $18.1 million), I had no choice but to rock with Wattenberg, who was credited by NGS with just 23 pressures and zero sacks allowed in 2025. Wright blossomed into a second-team All-Pro while helping the Bears keep Caleb Williams<\/a> clean enough to play like a star.<\/p>\n The backups could easily start on any other roster, which I can say with authority because they have started on their actual rosters. Rasheed Walker, Warren McClendon, Tanor Bortolini and Mason McCormick belong to one of my favorite subgroups of players: Day 3 picks made good.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"2026 cap number: $1,266,224 (R-4) I would have liked to drop $20 million-plus on at least one premium…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":692851,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[63],"tags":[4687,8849,14384,79038,15947,31119,1807,31123,73621,1822,1799,119096,300486,1816,300484,93689,7820,1810,36489,73905,28650,1804,300482,300485,4058,3686,2592,31109,214728,1811,84135,36487,15355,58296,1236,27338,44545,46799,160824,38910,31114,300479,1812,6337,1820,111248,9108,8851,300483,14383,1815,1814,349,300480,83046,61657,88753,6257,1821,113553,36485,1239,1321,197689,95920,192889,560,27557,99,73907,1824,300481,52564,233421,3851,61099,24180,84406,115305,96930],"class_list":["post-692850","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-nfl","tag-analysis","tag-baltimore-ravens","tag-bo-nix","tag-brandon-aubrey","tag-brock-bowers","tag-bucky-irving","tag-buffalo-bills","tag-chase-brown","tag-christian-benford","tag-cincinnati-bengals","tag-cleveland-browns","tag-cooper-dejean","tag-corey-bojorquez","tag-dallas-cowboys","tag-davon-godchaux","tag-deatrich-wise","tag-denver-broncos","tag-detroit-lions","tag-dominick-puni","tag-evan-engram","tag-fred-warner","tag-green-bay-packers","tag-greg-rousseau","tag-henry-tootoo","tag-houston-texans","tag-indianapolis-colts","tag-isaiah-likely","tag-isiah-pacheco","tag-ivan-pace-jr","tag-jacksonville-jaguars","tag-jalen-carter","tag-jordan-mailata","tag-justin-jefferson","tag-kamren-kinchens","tag-kansas-city-chiefs","tag-kavontae-turpin","tag-kerby-joseph","tag-khalil-shakir","tag-kobie-turner","tag-kyle-hamilton","tag-ladd-mcconkey","tag-landon-dickerson","tag-las-vegas-raiders","tag-los-angeles-chargers","tag-los-angeles-rams","tag-marcus-jones","tag-micah-parsons","tag-minnesota-vikings","tag-moro-ojomo","tag-myles-garrett","tag-new-england-patriots","tag-new-orleans-saints","tag-nfl","tag-nick-allegretti","tag-nick-herbig","tag-nico-collins","tag-nik-bonitto","tag-no-minute","tag-patrick-mahomes","tag-patrick-surtain-ii","tag-penei-sewell","tag-philadelphia-eagles","tag-pittsburgh-steelers","tag-poona-ford","tag-puka-nacua","tag-ross-matiscik","tag-san-francisco-49ers","tag-saquon-barkley","tag-sports","tag-talanoa-hufanga","tag-tampa-bay-buccaneers","tag-tanor-bortolini","tag-tarheeb-still","tag-teven-jenkins","tag-washington-commanders","tag-zach-frazier","tag-zach-tom","tag-zack-baun","tag-zaire-franklin","tag-zyon-mccollum"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/692850","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=692850"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/692850\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/692851"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=692850"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=692850"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=692850"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}