Carolina Panthers defensive tackle Kawann Short is the team’s premier pending free agent this offseason and one many other teams are carefully keeping an eye out on. With another tremendous season of work under his belt, Short could be in line for a contract that puts him among the top earners on defense.

While there has been speculation as to whether the Panthers will use the franchise tag on Short or if they’ll let him walk away, there has been little discussed on how much he can actually earn. So we took a look at previous free agency periods to garner a sense of where Short will fall this offseason.

First we have to find some comparable players to gauge what the market is willing to pay. We scoured the rosters for players that signed deals recently and at a similar age and production to Short so we can compare apples to apples here.

Player name Age when signed Average sacks per year Contract Length Total Value Average Value Kawann Short 28 (2017) 5.5 ? ? ? Ndamukong Suh 28 (2015) 7 6 years $114,375,000 $19,062,500 Fletcher Cox 25 (2016) 5.5 6 years $102,600,000 $17,100,000 Malik Jackson 26 (2016) 3.5 (4.67 if not counting rookie season) 6 years $85,500,000 $14,250,000 Marcell Dareus 25 (2015) 6.75 6 years $96,574,118 $16,095,686 Gerald McCoy 26 (2015) 5.3 6 years $95,200,000 $15,866,667

As you can see from the above, Miami Dolphins defensive tackle Ndamukong Suh is the outlier on the high side. This is likely due to Suh hitting the open market and various teams throwing offers at him, trying to outbid one another for his services. The Dolphins had a significant amount of cap space and chose to spend it on Suh.

While I’d fully expect the open market to do something similar if Short were to enter the free agent pool, I doubt the Panthers will allow that to happen. Either they’d lock him up long term or they’ll have the franchise tag at their disposal to keep him in town for another season, giving them a little leverage in negotiations.

However, when you look at the production of each player recently signed, they all hover around the same level. The contract length is the same and the ages are the same. The outlier there is on Short, who enters free agency 28 years old, a full two-years older. Though I wouldn’t expect Short’s age to really count against him much in the same way former Carolina cornerback Josh Norman had no issues last offseason.

With a year between many of these contracts and now, the cap inflation should give Short the edge on his contract. Because everything else is so similar, there’s no reason to think that a fair offer would be a six-year, $105 million deal with $40 million in guarantees.

It’s a tough pill to swallow and will likely eat up a lot of the Panthers’ cap space in 2017. However, they get a defensive tackle that even when the focus of offenses, is able to shed double teams and get penetration. That type of talent is worth top dollar in the NFL and Carolina is likely to pay for it if they wish to be competitive on defense.