Chad Greenway a Candidate For Contract Restructure

Dec 15, 2013; Minneapolis, MN, USA; Minnesota Vikings linebacker Chad Greenway (52) warms up before the game against the Philadelphia Eagles at Mall of America Field at H.H.H. Metrodome. Mandatory Credit: Bruce Kluckhohn-USA TODAY Sports

Rotoworld’s Evan Silva has compiled a very long list of players whose contract situations make them candidates to be restructured or cut by their teams this offseason. Several Vikings are on this list, including Chad Greenway.

Silva is hardly the first person to suggest the Vikings might approach Greenway about a restructure. Given Greenway’s drop in production last season, it’s only natural to believe the Vikings will at least consider this move.

Greenway is under contract for two more years. His cap number for 2014 is $8.2 million. In 2015 that number jumps to $8.8 million. Those are large numbers for a player who is arguably in steep decline.

Even if Greenway rebounds in 2014 under Mike Zimmer and George Edwards, that’s a lot of salary cap to have tied up in at best a slightly-above-average linebacker.

2013 defensive starters Letroy Guion, Jamarca Sanford and Erin Henderson are also seen as candidates for restructure or release by Silva’s reckoning.

I would lean more toward release on all three of those players. Henderson has likely run out of chances in Minnesota after a pair of DWI arrests in a short span of time. Guion and Sanford were both Leslie Frazier guys and, well, Leslie Frazier isn’t around anymore.

Mike Zimmer and his staff will take a cold hard look at these players and everyone else on the Vikings’ roster and offer an assessment not colored by personal loyalty. That’s the great thing about turning over a coaching staff. You bring in a whole new set of eyes, and gain a whole new fresh perspective on your roster.

Of course Rick Spielman has final say in personnel, but he still needs to listen hard to Zimmer’s recommendations on defensive players especially. Zim knows more about defense than Rick. I’d be curious to know what Zimmer thinks of guys like Guion and Sanford.

And Chad Greenway, for that matter.

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