How will chris samuels's retirement affect our cap?

[Schneed10]

For cap purposes, a retirement has the same cap effect as a release.

If Samuels retires, next season he will take up $14.4 million in dead money, as opposed to taking up $4.9 if he were on the roster. That's an incremental hit of $9.5 million.

We currently have approximately $109 million in 2010 cap dollars tied up in 36 players. The cap (if there is one, which I don't think there will be) is expected to be $136-140 million next season.

Samuels' retirement would take our cap dollars up to $118.5, leaving us with about $18-22 million remaining in cap space. Further space could be cleared through contract restructures and the like.

It does not appear cap space would be a major constraint in the offseason, even given Samuels' retirement. But I doubt there's a cap at all, negotiations between the NFL and the players association have still not made much progress to date.