Here’s a bombshell: the New Orleans Saints signed backup quarterback, special teams ace, and do-it-all weapon Taysom Hill to a contract extension through the 2021 season on Sunday. Per Charles Robinson of Yahoo Sports, Hill is cashing in with a two-year deal valued at $21 million, with $16 million in guarantees and another $1 million in incentives.
That’s an average of $10.5 million per year, with 76% of the new money guaranteed. It’s a significant payout for a backup passer — making Hill by far the NFL’s highest-paid No. 2 — but as we’ve seen before, he’s much more than a clipboard-holder on the sidelines. Hill influences the game in a number of unique ways for the Saints, so they’re really paying him for a wide range of responsibilities beyond wearing a headset.
The Saints are also paying Hill a salary that suggests he’ll be more than a backup. He’ll get a real shot at competing for the starting quarterback job in 2021 if Brees retires.
We don’t know how much of those guarantees are tied to a signing bonus, so it’s tough to forecast Hill’s annual salary cap hits. And it makes learning how this contract is structured even more fascinating. The Saints often use automatically voided years to spread out salary cap resources, and that could come into play again with Hill (especially considering that the Saints have just over $4 million in 2020 cap space to work with right now).
However it shakes out, Hill won’t test the free agent market until March 2022 at the soonest.
