Here is what you need to know on this Monday, April 2, 24 days before the NFL draft.

Monday morning five pack

—The Redskins have about $17.3 million in cap space remaining. They will need a net of about $2.5 million to sign their draft picks (a post detailing that coming later this week). They want to go into the season with about $5 million to cover the practice squad and players they need to sign as injury replacements. So, they have about $10 million that they can either spend or roll over into 2019.

—What could they spend the remaining money on? I’m not sure if there is still an offer on the table for D-lineman Johnathan Hankins. However, he doesn’t appear to be drawing much interest around the league at his current asking price. If his agent called Redskins Park I would think that they would be receptive to working something out. They also could invest some in contract extensions for Preston Smith, Jamison Crowder, and Brandon Scherff. Again, they can roll it over to 2019 if they can’t work out deals to spend it on anything this year.

—Saving some for 2019 might not be a bad idea. Per Over the Cap the Redskins have $22 million in cap space next year. That doesn’t sound that bad but only two teams currently have less. There are several high-priced players on whom they might have to make decisions. There will be more on that coming in a future post about succession planning in the draft.

—One more note on the salary cap here. Redskins salary cap guru Eric Schaffer believes that for a team to operate under the cap, about half of the players on the roster need to be on rookie contracts. Right now, of the players I currently figure will be on the depth chart (offense, defense) 21 are on rookie contracts. It’s safe to say that five or six of the eight draft picks will make the team so 26 or so (give or take a few since some of the draft picks may replace players on rookie deals) will be on rookie deals or just about half of the 53-man roster. In that regard, the 53 should be fairly well constructed.

—There are about three and a half weeks to go until the NFL draft. If past patterns hold the Redskins, along with most other NFL teams, will be mostly done with their work with their draft board set in about two weeks. That means that the last 10 days the personnel department and coaches don’t have much to do. They will run through mock draft scenarios, perhaps fly out to work out a player or two. The danger of overthinking things and using the extra time to poke holes in various prospects if always present.

Stay up to date on the Redskins. Rich Tandler covers the team 365 days a year. Like his Facebook page Facebook.com/TandlerNBCSand follow him on Twitter @TandlerNBCS.

Tandler on Twitter

That would cost next year’s first-round pick plus more. It’s not happening. — Rich Tandler (@TandlerNBCS) April 1, 2018

Timeline

Days until:



—Offseason workouts begin (4/16) 14

—Training camp starts (approx. 7/26) 116

—2018 NFL season starts (9/9) 160

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