In reply to Boo Daddy.

Most NFL contracts have a certain amount of a guaranteed money associated with them. NFL teams structures the accounting of those contracts so that more of the guaranteed money counts in the early years than later years, so that players are easier to release down the road as age, injury, or other problems cause them to under-perform their salary and/or cap hit.

For example, Ezekiel Elliott's new contract still has $25.8M in dead money associated with it. Dallas couldn't hardly cut him now even if they wanted to; he'd take up a greater chunk of cap space off the roster than on it. But next year that number drops to $14M, then $10M in 2022, and so on.

Note that this doesn't affect when the player receives his money. The signing bonuses is paid up front and the base salaries are year-to-year. But dead money is all about accounting within the contract that helps teams stay within the salary cap.