Nick Foles' Contract is an Anchor on the Jaguars

Nick Foles
Nick Foles / Sam Greenwood/Getty Images
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Nick Foles was benched by the Jacksonville Jaguars on Sunday and his enormous contract is looking like a massive problem for the franchise.

Foles was pulled at the half against the Tampa Bay Buccaneers after finishing the half 7-of-14 for 93 yards, with no touchdowns and an interception. He also lost two fumbles.

It got so bad the crowd was calling for rookie Gardner Minshew to enter the game:

And folks on Twitter were wondering why Foles had even regained his job after returning from injury:

Entering Sunday, Foles had played in three games and completed 68.0 percent of his passes for 643 yards (just 6.2 yards per attempt), with three touchdowns and an interception. He's really failed to do anything of note in Jacksonville and the Jags were 0-3 in his starts.

Minshew is the better quarterback for the Jaguars right now and likely in the future. The problem? This offseason, the Jags handed Foles a four-year, $88 million deal with $50.1 million guaranteed. If they cut him, he'd cost $33.875 million against the salary cap in 2020. That's an enormous chunk of change that the Jags simply can't swallow in dead cap space.

They're stuck with Foles whether they like it or not, because no one is trading for that contract. Jacksonville's best bet would be to just bite the bullet and start Minshew until Foles' contract is manageable to cut, which it will be in 2021 when it would cost only 12.5M in dead cap space.