Contract terms via Over The Cap <\/a><\/p>\nBase salary: $1.37 million (fully guaranteed)Signing bonus: $900,000Per game bonuses: up to $680,000 ($640,000 counts against cap)Workout bonus: $50,000TOTAL CAP HIT: $2,960,000Dead cap if cut: $2,270,000<\/p>\n
Overall, this a relatively modest contract for Wonnum, and certainly lower than the initially reported terms of \u201cup to $6 million\u201d which inflates the actual terms of the deal by double. However, that does suggest there are a ton of performance incentives built into the contract that won\u2019t affect this year\u2019s salary cap, but if earned will be added to 2027\u2019s cap. Those details haven\u2019t been made public yet, but they typically include things like sacks, team performance, etc.<\/p>\n
As of now, Wonnum\u2019s contract ranks just 74th out of 212 edge contracts in terms of per year value. While he\u2019s likely to play a different role on defense than Al-Quadin Muhammad (Wonnum projects to be an early down player, while Muhammad was more of a third-down specialist), it\u2019s still worth comparing the two contracts.<\/p>\n
Muhammad contract \u2014 one year, $4 million ($2.5 million guaranteed) <\/p>\n
Base salary: $1.8 million ($500,000 guaranteed)Roster bonus: $2 millionPer game bonuses: Up to $200,000Performance bonuses: $1.25 millionTOTAL CAP HIT: $5,250,000<\/p>\n
On the surface, it looks like Muhammad\u2019s contract is significantly more than Wonnum, and in terms of 2026 cap hit, it is. But the key is the performance bonuses on both contracts. Because Muhammad is coming off an 11-sack season, his performance bonuses appear to be considered \u201cLikely To Be Earned,\u201d which means they count against this year\u2019s cap. For example, if one of Muhammad\u2019s bonuses is earned if he hits 10 sacks for the season, that\u2019s \u201cLikely to be Earned\u201d because he made it there last season. If Wonnum has the exact same bonus in his contract, it is considered \u201cNot Likely to be Earned\u201d because he only had three sacks last year. \u201cNot Likely to be Earned\u201d incentives don\u2019t count against the salary cap initially, but if the player achieves the goal, it\u2019s added to the next year\u2019s salary cap.<\/p>\n
Take away the performance bonuses, and it\u2019s a one-year, $3 million deal for Wonnum vs. a one-year, $4 million deal for Muhammad.<\/p>\n
But in all honesty, Wonnum\u2019s contract should be compared to the player he\u2019s likely replacing: Marcus Davenport. Given the amount of playing time and the specific roles they play will overlap considerably, it\u2019s worth noting that Detroit made a slightly higher investment in that position than they last year. Davenport, coming off another injury-riddled season, was given a one-year, $2.5 million deal in 2025 after signing a one-year, $6.5 million deal the year prior. Wonnum\u2019s $3 million deal with another $3 million in potential incentives represents a slight increase.<\/p>\n
It\u2019s still a pretty low investment in a position that many were hoping for a splash move, but with Muhammad\u2019s role still yet to be replaced on the roster, perhaps Detroit isn\u2019t done adding to the edge position. And there\u2019s always next month\u2019s NFL Draft.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Every year, NFL media tries to warn fans not to overreact to initial contract terms, and every year,…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":829103,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2071],"tags":[146,113,52187,449,153,2506,7,147,6],"class_list":["post-829102","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-detroit-lions","tag-detroit","tag-detroit-lions","tag-detroit-lions-contracts-and-salary-cap","tag-detroit-lions-analysis","tag-detroit-lions-news","tag-detroitlions","tag-football","tag-lions","tag-nfl"],"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/channels.im\/@nfl\/116278686337686631","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/829102","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=829102"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/829102\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/829103"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=829102"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=829102"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=829102"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}