Is Washington Redskins Vinny Cerrato a Watered-down Matt Millen?
I recently came across a Washington Post article from 2005, where Mike Wise spoke with Vinny Cerrato about his worst decisions and lessons learned: “Biggest regret? Probably in 2000, signing all those older guys,” Cerrato said. “I learned you can’t put a lot of signing bonuses on veteran players cause they’re not going to play out those years. That was a mistake I made and learned from. Bruce Smith, Deion and Mark Carrier were the big ones…Now, we try to avoid dead money, money that counts against your cap and doesn’t go to anybody.” (The Redskins are among NFL leaders with $16 million of their 2005 salary cap devoted to players no longer on the roster). This is pure comedy. Fast forward four years to today and the Redskins are almost exactly at $16 million in dead cap money (Brandon Lloyd leading the charge at $5mil+). In my opinion, Cerrato correctly fixed the problem with signing veterans past their prime, but we certainly have not fixed the problem of building through the draft.
