The 2021 NFL season kicked off this weekend. An army of analysts, prognosticators, poolies, algorithm cowboys and former players has produced a raft of predictions on what could happen come Super Bowl next February.

Can Tom Brady and the Tampa Bay Buccaneers repeat? Will any team go 0-17? Will offence soar and turnovers drop as they did in 2020’s Covid-crippled season? When will the Bears start Justin Fields and the 49ers start Trey Lance?

One thing that seems sure amidst the data breakdowns and the football clichés: Unless Tom Brady wins yet another SB, the team hoisting the trophy is most likely going to be a team with a QB on a manageable salary-cap number. Outside of Brady’s SB wins the past decade, the teams that have won the NFL’s top prize— or played in the big game— have had QBs on entry-level contracts at a fraction of what the big boys make.

Why does that loom large in any prediction? Because to assemble a full team with depth at crucial positions you cannot have one player— even one as important as QB— dominating too much of the $182,500,000 team 2021 salary cap. Brady has often been one of the highest paid players in the game, but he has rarely set the high bar his talent deserved. That allowed his head coach Bill Belichick wiggle room to gather the right mix for his six-time NFL champions.

That frugality from a QB does not happen elsewhere. Agents see to that. So for a time you had the Detroit Lions— who’ve won one postseason game since 1957— paying Matthew Stafford the most of any QB in the league. Meanwhile you had QBs with a much lower salary drag— Russell Wilson, Patrick Mahomes, Carson Wentz/ Nick Foles, Joe Flacco, Drew Brees— winning it all come Super Bowl.

As well you had affordable QBs Cam Newton, Colin Kaepernick, Jimmy Garappolo and Jared Goff taking their teams to the SB but losing. The window can only stay open through Year Five of a player’s career in the NFL (some contracts are renegotiated before the five-year max.) when a player must be offered a new contract or let go.

Here’s a breakdown from overthecap.com on just who’s making what in 2021.

So in 2021 you may like the chances of Josh Allen (Buf), Russell Wilson (Sea), Dak Prescott (Dal), Aaron Rodgers (GB) or, yes, Patrick Mahomes (KC) getting to the pigskin Parnassus next February. But here are the salary-cap numbers that should give you pause before laying down hard-earned money:

Allen $ 43 M

Wilson $35

Prescott $40

Rodgers $33.5 M

Mahomes $45 M

In Mahomes’ case that’s about 27 percent of the Chiefs $169,663,383 cap number. So, outside of the Methuselah Brady, who qualifies this year as a likely bargain SB QB? Here’s a short list to help you win a little long-shot money in 2021:

Baker Mayfield (Cle) $8,170,745

Jameis Winston (NO) $ 5.5 M

Ryan Fitzpatrick (Was) $ 10 M

Kyler Murray (Arz) $8,789,661

Tua Tagovailoa $7,568,859

Heck, if you believe his performance on the first Sunday Night game. Matthew Stafford, now with the Rams, is suddenly on the bargain end of the QB scale at $27 M. A lot of people like his chances of rallying the Rams to their first SB win since Kurt Warner in SB 34.

Before you get too excited about this trend, remember that next year the NFL’s new TV/ digital deals kick in. The expectation is that the cap will soar to $200 M. Suddenly Mahomes’ $45 M price tag is not the millstone it will be this year for the Chiefs to assemble a champion. His tag will go from approximately 25 percent to single digits.

Likewise Allen, Prescott, Wilson and Rodgers won’t be crushing their team’s payroll as much as they do this year. Likely they will see others pass them in the millionaires row of NFL stardom with even larger deals than that signed by Mahomes last year.

One thing to watch for—even under an inflated cap— is teams that have too much money tied up in their top three for four players. Again using Stafford’s Detroit teams of the last mid-decade, the Lions had just three players— Stafford, receiver Calvin Johnson and defensive tackle Ndamkung Suh— tying up 40 percent of the club’s salary cap; as a result, Detroit could never assemble the other parts of the puzzle to win in one of the three years Stafford made the postseason.

There are owners who like to collect big-name players to satisfy their vanity— hello Jerry Jones— and they continually run into salary-cap crunches as a result. So when assessing futures plays you might want to look at just how a few players take the (ahem) lion’s share of the money.

One other factor to look for when deciding who will be in Los Angeles for the Super Bowl is the amount of money a team is paying in “dead” money. Ie. money they’ve had to retain on their own payroll even after a player has left the team. Teams with lots of “dead money” also are hamstrung when it comes to getting the depth a team needs for a title run.

In 2021 the biggest transgressors here are Philadelphia ($50,050,888), Detroit ($48,226,475), Carolina ($45,666,697) and the Rams ($39,473,971). For their hangover, the Eagles, Panthers and Rans can at least content themselves with appearances in the Super Bowl or the Conference championship game during recent times. The Lions? Please.

For more on the operation of salary caps see my book Cap In Hand: How Salary Caps Are Killing Sports And Why The Free Market Can Save Them (brucedowbigginbook.ca)

Bruce Dowbiggin @dowbboy is the editor of Not The Public Broadcaster (http://www.notthepublicbroadcaster.com). The best-selling author of Cap In Hand is also a regular contributor to Sirius XM Canada Talks Ch. 167. A two-time winner of the Gemini Award as Canada's top television sports broadcaster, his new book Personal Account with Tony Comper is now available on http://brucedowbigginbooks.ca/book-personalaccount.aspx

NFL QBs: The More You Pay The Less They're Worth?