Sharrif Floyd dispute stems from 2017 compensation

Yesterday, we talked briefly about how the Minnesota Vikings and defensive tackle Sharrif Floyd were locked into some “legal issues” that had put a halt to the team potentially releasing the former first-round pick. Today, one of the Vikings’ beat writers has shed a little more light on precisely what’s going on between the two parties.

Ben Goessling of the Minneapolis Star-Tribune has an article up today about exactly what’s going on between Floyd and the Vikings. Apparently, the Vikings did not pay Floyd his entire $6.757 million salary for 2017 as many (including myself) had previously thought.

The Vikings had picked up Floyd’s $6.76 million fifth-year option in May 2016, and the amount was guaranteed for injury until the start of the 2017 league year. However, because Floyd was still rehabbing his injury in March, the Vikings were not unable to release him.

Instead, after placing him on the NFI list, they decided to pay him $2 million and add the $6,450 workout bonus to his 2017 compensation. Before a grievance is settled, 40 percent of the grievance amount counts against a team’s salary cap; Floyd’s grievance is currently counting for $1,902,800 against the Vikings’ cap, bringing his total number to $3,909,250 for the year.

As we pointed out in our article that we put together during Training Camp about the difference between the Physically Unable to Perform and Non-Football Injury lists, a team is not obligated to pay a player their base salary if they go on the NFI list. That’s the list that the team placed Floyd on when players reported to Training Camp, more than likely because the injury that is keeping Floyd off of the field did not happen on the football field, but rather during the surgery that Floyd underwent following the 2016 regular season opener. Had the Vikings put him on the PUP list and not the NFI list, they would have been obligated to pay him his entire salary.

That’s, apparently, where the rub lies between Floyd and the Vikings. From the sound of Goessling’s article, the two parties are attempting to work out some sort of settlement. Floyd’s camp will, of course, argue that Floyd’s inability to play football is because of something that’s football-related, despite the fact that the nerve damage that is causing his quadriceps to not “fire” properly occurred during what should have been a routine knee scope in an operating theater rather than on the field of play.

So, that’s why things between Sharrif Floyd and the Minnesota Vikings are a bit strained at the present time. Hopefully the situation will work itself out to the benefit of both parties here over the course of the next few weeks or so.