New York Giants have big decisions to make with Nate Solder
By Ed Stein
Option 1 – Do nothing
Maybe 2019 was an anomaly or Nate Solder had some injury that wasn’t made public. New York Giants General Manager Dave Gettleman would be taking a huge risk by leaving Solder at left tackle.
Option 2 – Release Solder
A simple solution would be to cut Solder. It’s not as easy as it sounds. If the New York Giants do release the tackle, they are on the hook for $13M in 2020 and $6.5M in 2021 of dead money against the NFL salary cap. That’s a huge dent. 2020’s salary cap will be between $196.8M to 201.2M, his dead space hit would be a big handicap to Big Blue’s ability to compete. In effect, taking away the salary they could give to a very good player.
Option 3 – Trade Solder
If Gettleman could pull this off, it would be a minor miracle, Seriously, who is going to trade for a 32-year-old declining left tackle with $31M remaining on his contract? Short answer, none. He’d be easier to trade (or cut) the following year.
Option 4 – Move Solder to RT
This seems like the most reasonable idea. Granted Solder would be making a ton of money for a right tackle, but its better than paying him to sit on the bench or absorbing all the dead money by cutting him. Neither backups Chris Slade or Nick Gates is getting promoted to the starter, so Big Blue would have to either draft a new starting left tackle in a class full of them, or they could sign a free agent.