Buffalo Bills quarterback Tyrod Taylor will take a $10 million pay cut as part of a restructured contract he signed last week, according to NFLPA documents obtained by ESPN.
Taylor will earn $30.5 million in 2017 and 2018 combined before his contract automatically voids on the fifth day after the Super Bowl in February 2019. Under his previous deal, Taylor would have earned $40.5 million in 2017 and 2018 combined if the Bills exercised an option in his contract that would have kept him under the team's control through 2021.
The Bills renegotiated Taylor's contract to avoid $30.75 million that would have become guaranteed March 11. Taylor will be fully guaranteed only $15.5 million under the terms of his restructured deal.
The pay cut suggests Taylor did not believe he could receive a better deal from another team if he had been released by the Bills. Taylor said last week his agent, Adisa Bakari, spoke informally with "a few teams" at the NFL combine earlier this month and after doing so, they decided to accept the reduced deal from Buffalo.
Had Taylor not accepted the pay cut, the Bills were expected to release him. Buffalo had interest last week in signing veteran Brian Hoyer, sources told ESPN, before Taylor agreed to the restructured deal and Hoyer joined the San Francisco 49ers.
Taylor's 2017 cap number will drop from $15.9 million to $9.7 million under the terms of the restructure. If the Bills choose to keep him for the 2018 season, his cap number will be $18.1 million; it would have been $16.8 million under his previous deal.
