Kenneth Murray didn't do much good for the LA Chargers during his four-year tenure with the team. Now on the Tennessee Titans, Murray is once again burning the Chargers but in a new way.
The Tennessee Titans overpaid Murray this past offseason, giving the Chargers a projected fifth-round compensatory pick based on his salary in the process. However, these compensatory picks are not official and there is a new wrinkle that could impact the Bolts.
Murray has a per-game roster bonus built into his contract with the Titans in 2024. The former first-round pick did not play in Week 14 and was a DNP in Tennessee's first practice of the week on Wednesday. If Murray misses enough games, there is a chance the Chargers' draft capital could take a hit as a result.
I just noticed that Kenneth Murray was out of last weekend's game due to a hamstring injury.
— Nick Korte (@nickkorte) December 10, 2024
If that causes him to miss more time, then that could be bad news for the Chargers, who could see a 2025 compensatory pick demoted from the 5th round to the 6th round.
Kenneth Murray's injury could hurt the Chargers' draft capital
Murray played in all 12 games for the Titans leading into Week 14 and has a $510,000 per game roster bonus. This is for the entire season, meaning that every game Murray misses costs him $30,000.
If Murray were to miss the Titans' last five games of the season it would reduce his value in the compensatory formula by $150,000. That monetary reduction could be enough to impact what pick the Chargers get for losing Murray.
It isn't just monetary factors that weigh into the compensatory formula, however. The contracts that qualify for compensatory picks are ranked (among all contracts in the NFL) by the following factors, via Over The Cap:
- An inverse ranking of the contract's Average Per Year (APY)
- One point each for each percentage point of snaps played on offense or defense, with a minimum requirement of 25%. (Kickers and punters earn points based upon statistical performance.)
- 20 or 5 points based upon being honored by the AP All-Pro or PFWA On Field Awards lists.
Those rankings are then broken into percentiles that determine where a compensatory pick falls. The top 5% garner third-round picks, the top 5% to 10% garner fourth-round picks, the top 10% to 15% garner fifth-round picks, the top 15% to 25% garner sixth-round picks, and the top 25% to 35% garner seventh-round picks.
Free agents a team signs that count toward the compensatory formula can offset compensatory picks. For example, if the Chargers signed a free agent to the exact same contract as Murray then it would offset.
However, the only free agents the Chargers signed that factored into the formula were Gus Edwards and Kristian Fulton, who offset the projected seventh-round picks the team would have received for losing Austin Ekeler and Austin Johnson. With the highest departing APY salary, Murray represented the best chance for the Chargers to get a higher pick.
Him getting hurt only hurts the Chargers. Not only is it lowering his APY but it lowers his snap count. Typically this would not make a difference but with Murray right on the fringe between the fifth and sixth-round, it does.
As it stands right now, the Chargers' projected compensatory pick for Murray has fallen to the sixth round with 1,695 compensatory points. The last compensatory pick in the fifth round, for comparison, has 1,696 points.
If Murray doesn't play then the pick will never climb back into the fifth round as his APY and snap count percentage will go down. And while this may not seem like a big deal, the difference between the lowest compensatory fifth-round pick and the highest compensatory sixth-round pick is still 33 picks.
That could be the difference between drafting Puka Nacua (who was the last compensatory fifth-round pick in 2023) and DeMario Douglas, who was picked 33 selections later.