Cardinals Have No Plans To Release Larry Fitzgerald, Despite His $23.6M Cap Figure

Update:

Cardinals GM Steve Keim mentioned that they have already factored WR Larry Fitzgerald‘s, staggering cap figure of $23.6 million into their plans, and they are hoping he’ll finish out his career in Arizona.

“We have to make good business decisions,” Keim told Arizona Sports 98.7, per Darren Urban. “I don’t think it’s any secret that we said all along that it is our intent to have Larry Fitzgerald retire a Cardinal. I don’t want to get into it too deep, but with planning purposes and financially, from a cap standpoint and all those sort of things, we have Larry’s [cap] number already baked into our numbers.

“Now, any kind of business decisions moving forward, renegotiations with Larry and that sort of thing, we’ve had ongoing talks with [agent] Eugene Parker and we will continue to have ongoing talks. But again, the best I can tell you is that it is our intent to keep Larry and make sure he stays a Cardinal the rest of his career.”

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Mike Florio of Pro Football Talk, citing a source with knowledge of the situation, reports that the Arizona Cardinals have no plans to release WR Larry Fitzgerald, despite his sizable cap figure of $23.6 million.

Florio mentions that there is a chance that Fitzgerald could be traded next year, restructure his contract, or possibly even negotiate a contract extension that could keep him with the Cardinals.

Fitzgerald previously acknowledged that they will have to do something to his contract next year.

“The cap number is what the cap number is,” Fitzgerald said back in September, via Darren Urban of AzCardinals.com. “I could go out this year and get 2,600 yards and that cap number is still going to have to be addressed, know what I mean? It doesn’t matter how well I play or how bad I play, it’s going to be addressed. I don’t even think about it.”

Fitzgerald, 31, is in the fourth year of his eight-year, $128.5 million contract that included $50 million guaranteed. After reworking his contract, Fitzgerald received an $11.75 million signing bonus and has a base salary of $1 million for the 2014 season.

Next year, Fitzgerald has an $8 million roster bonus that’s due in March to go along with his base salary of $8 million in 2015.

After that, his salaries are $15 million and $14.75 million from the final two years of the agreement.

Coming into Sunday night’s game, Fitzgerald has caught 57 passes for 722 yards and two touchdowns over the course of 12 games. Pro Football Focus has him rated as the No. 28 receiver out of 112 qualifying players.