[sportscurmudgeon]

Matty:

You are correct; the rookie cap is a separate number calculated by a specific formula.

HOWEVER, the rookies have to fit into the team cap; they are not over and above the team salary cap. A couple of years ago, the 49ers were in a position where they had to make trades on draft day or lose their picks because they would not have had enough money to pay the picks because of their cap problems. As I recall, they released a player of two that day and traded down to get a boatload of 5th and 6th round picks that would be "minimum salary contracts".

The other issue with rookie contracts at the very top of the draft is that while they can be cap freindly for a couple of years, they tend to blow up quickly because they have big signing bonuses AND they tend to be heavily backoaded so the player can get an ego massage and say he has a $50M deal. By year three or four, some of them are pretty burdensome. For example: Samuels, Chris.