Cardinals restructure Deandre Hopkins’ contract to…

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The Cardinals were slated to be very low on salary cap space when the new league year starts tomorrow, but now they’ve given themselves some breathing room.

A $10.65 million roster bonus that was due to wide receiver DeAndre Hopkins will instead be structured as a signing bonus, according to Field Yates of ESPN.

That structure allows the Cardinals to spread out the cap hit equally over the remaining three years of Hopkins’ contract, rather than having the money all hit the salary cap this year. That opens up $7.1 million in cap space for 2022.

The biggest question facing the Cardinals this offseason is whether they’ll agree to terms with quarterback Kyler Murray on a long-term contract extension. But they have other priorities as well, and restructuring Hopkins will allow them to get to work on some of those other priorities while the Murray contract looms large.