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Speculating about free agency is a pastime for fans of teams that failed to qualify for the playoffs—or in today's case, have already been eliminated.

But, with free agency now on the horizon, it's time to curb the wild speculation and separate the contenders from the pretenders. In other words, it's time to establish which NFL teams actually have the cap space to compete in free agency and which teams will sit by the sidelines.

ESPN's John Clayton provided a great breakdown of each team's projected cap space headed into 2013, and these figures are used in this article—along with analysis, of course.

These projected cap numbers are subject to change as teams cut and restructure contracts over the next two months. Anyway, here's an idea of how each NFL team shapes up financially heading into a free-agency period that figures to feature plenty of talent.