Raiders free up cap room by restructuring Rodney Hudson’s contract

After a free agency period that saw the Raiders add some 23 players, their cap space was down to basically nothing. Today they added a sizable chunk to that available money by restructuring center Rodney Hudson’s contract according to ESPN’s Field Yates.

Suddenly picking up nearly $6 million in cap space at this point is huge. Hudson’s not going anywhere, so it doesn’t hurt them to give him some guarantees upfront on the remaining two years of his contract.

The 28-year-old Hudson signed a lucrative five-year deal with the Raiders in 2015 that made him the highest paid center in the NFL at that time, earning an average of $9 million per season. He was set to $8.45 million this season with no guaranteed money remaining. Now he gets some guaranteed money and the Raiders get some cap space.

As Al Davis always proved, you can always find a way to create cap space. Thereby removing excuses for not signing the players you need (cough-NaVorro-Bowman-cough).