A new study from The Athletic shows the Patriots haven’t been spending as much on players as most of their peers.
Mike Sando examined cash spending trends over the past decade, and Robert Kraft’s team finished 31st in “cash-over-cap.” Over the past 10 years, only the Pittsburgh Steelers spent less with that metric.
“I’m not sure New England believes that salary-cap management is a strategic area,” an exec told Sando. “They have treated it more like a function.”
The Patriots currently have by far the most cap space in the league ($53 million), but are 12th in cash spending for 2025 after splurging on Milton Williams, Carlton Davis, Stefon Diggs, and others in free agency.
“The New England model used to be a bunch of incentives, and they got guys to re-sign because (Tom) Brady took less for all those years,” a second exec told Sando. “Everyone else took less. But free agency this year, they went nuts.”
Robert Kraft has long said that Patriots execs are free to spend as they see fit, and if cash flow was ever an issue, he’d sell the team.
“We’ve always had a situation where we spend to the cap,” Kraft said in January. “We have never told any coach or limited to spending. ... Spending to the cap or above the cap is not – we want to win. That’s our priority first.”
The cash-over-cap number for the Patriots was 0.9%, so they’ve spent past the cap, but other teams have gone as high as 27.4% (Cleveland), 23.3% (San Francisco) and 20.3% (Philadelphia).
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