NFC North Resource Allocation

First up in a nine-part series - Looking at how the NFC North builds their rosters

This is the first piece in a nine-week project. Each week we’ll take one division, build a single comparable resource value for every player on every projected 53-man roster, and lay out what the numbers describe. The point of this stretch is discovering what differences, if any, can be gleaned from how each team builds out their roster.

There is a piece of analysis the NFL discourse keeps missing. Every offseason, writers compare cap charges or cash spending by position. Every offseason, that comparison misses half the picture.

Where this differs from other similar endeavors in the past is the application of my draft trade chart. That chart applies a cap/cash valuation to each pick in the draft, giving us the ability to look at how teams allocate both currencies, draft capital and cash, in a single comparable framework.

We start with the NFC North.

The Framework

Most people talk about asset allocation by cap hit. But cap hits are just accounting gymnastics dressed up as financial outlays. Every team has the same cap allocation each year, more or less. Where the real differences lie is in actual cash outlays. Take a quick look at cash spending by team this year. From Over The Cap:

There is a $170 million spread between the Eagles and the Dolphins. That creates a real difference in access to talent, and a real signal about which teams are putting their best foot forward to actually win.

But there is also draft capital to consider. A team that uses a top 10 pick on a quarterback isn’t going to spend much in free agency on the position (unless that team is the Falcons). That doesn’t mean they haven’t sunk considerable resources into the position. And any real analysis of asset allocation should account for that accordingly.

That’s where my work defining draft picks by cap/cash dollars helps fill the final void. This model translates pick numbers to cap/cash dollars annualized over four years so they're directly addable to vet contracts.

The NFC North From 10,000 Feet

Four teams. And one of these is not like the others.

Three teams clustered inside $16M of each other. Minnesota sits roughly $100M below the next-lowest team in the division.

Two things surface when looking at this graph within the context of the table before it.

First, the Vikings trail from a combination of low cash spending (29th leaguewide) and the lowest contribution of draft picks in the division. Minnesota is putting together their team with bubblegum and cheap vets.

Second, despite spending marginally more than Minnesota in cash ($10 million more - 27th leaguewide), the Bears make up for it with all of the draft capital they collected stemming from the Bryce Young trade three years ago.

Asset Allocation by Type

Total spend tells you how much in assets each team is putting on the field. But how those assets are mixing tells you more.

Reading across the table:

Chicago has the highest rookie pick share in the division. Of every dollar of resource value on their projected 53, 44.9 cents corresponds to a rookie’s draft pick. That share is roughly eight points higher than the next team.

Detroit and Green Bay are nearly identical. Both teams sit at 47% total rookie share, both teams have vet cash shares within half a point of each other, both teams have rookie pick shares within two points. Two organizations that look very different in style and personnel have arrived at nearly the same resource construction.

Minnesota is the most vet-heavy team in the division. 57.1% of their projected resource value goes to veteran contracts, and only 42.9% to anything still on a rookie deal.

What the rookie share does not tell us is whether higher or lower is better. It tells us how much of the team is still cost-controlled and how much has already been paid. A higher rookie share means more upcoming second-contract decisions. A lower share means more of those decisions are already in the books. Whether a team is positioned well or poorly by that metric depends on context the league-wide view will give us later in this series. For now, the picture is clearer at the position level.

Cash vs Draft Capital, Team by Team

The earlier graph tells the total commitment from a team. But looking below the total you can see the breakdown by position group. Each team gets two side-by-side radars. The left radar plots only 2026 cash by position group. That covers every veteran contract, every UDFA, and the rookie cash component of every rookie deal. The right radar plots only draft capital, defined as the annualized pick value of every player still on his original rookie contract. Both radars use the same $0 to $100M scale, so the two shapes for any one team can be compared directly.

The cash radars look broadly similar across teams: large at DL, OL, and somewhere in the secondary or quarterback. That is what veteran contracts buy. The draft capital radars are where the four teams diverge most clearly. Different front offices have spent their picks on different position groups.

Chicago’s cash side leans defensive: DL ($67M), SEC ($58M), and OL ($51M) dominate the shape. Sweat, Jarrett, Odeyingbo, Johnson, Gordon, Bryant, plus the three trade-acquired offensive line vets do most of that work. The draft capital side leans offensive: Williams’s #1 overall pick value sits at $33M at QB, Odunze and Burden combine for $38M at WR, and the OL ($39M) plus DL ($28M) take the rest. Two different currencies, two different sides of the ball.

Detroit's cash side is QB-and-trenches heavy. Goff at $58M, the DL extensions (Hutchinson + McNeill) at $70M combined, and the OL at $52M anchor the shape. The draft capital side leans most heavily into the trenches: $37M of pick value at OL (Sewell + Miller) and $35M at DL (Moore + Williams). Detroit's draft capital and cash radars both point in the same direction. They have invested both currencies in their lines.

Green Bay’s cash radar shows the single most extreme spike in the division: $82M at DL, almost entirely on Micah Parsons and Javon Hargrave. The OL ($48M) is the second largest cash bucket. The draft capital radar is the most evenly distributed of any team in the division. Seven of nine position groups carry between $18M and $40M of pick value. Green Bay has diversified its draft capital more broadly than any other team here.

Minnesota’s cash radar looks like the other three teams’ cash radars in shape: OL ($61M), DL ($45M), SEC ($39M), and WR ($33M) form the largest commitments. But the actual outlays are over 20% shy of the Lions.

The draft capital radar also sets the Vikings apart. Only DL ($41M, almost all of which is Banks and Turner) reaches the third ring. Everything else is below $20M. The Vikings’ have a draft capital gap in addition to a cash gap.

That last point is worth sitting with for a second. Minnesota could very well be competitive this year. With some of the most creative minds in the game heading both their offense and defense, this analysis may give real signal as to the actual value of coaching in dollars as one planet would signal the existence of another with erratic movements in the sky to early astronomers.

Where the Money Actually Goes

Looking at each team set against each other by position group provides the most streamlined look at who is spending what where. Each team spends by position in roughly the same order. That order is largely governed by the size of the position group.

Defensive line first, offensive line second, secondary third. All four teams follow that order. The specific deviations sit further down the table, and that's where each front office's philosophy actually shows up

Reading the chart by team rather than by position makes the deviations clearer. Here's where each team's spending priorities fall internally.

Quarterback

Four very different QB situations. The Lions ($58M) and Packers ($54M) are both paying full freight on veteran contracts (Goff and Love). The Bears ($44M) sit lower despite Caleb Williams being the most expensive draft pick in the division, because the pick value annualized over four years still comes out cheaper than a market-rate veteran. The Vikings ($26M) sit dramatically lower for two reasons: Kyler Murray is on a league-minimum deal, and pick value drops steeply from #1 to #10, meaning McCarthy's pick capital doesn't carry the weight Williams's does.

The Caleb Williams math is the cleanest illustration of this framework. His pick value, annualized, is $32.7M per year. His actual 2026 cash is $4.4M. The gap is the opportunity cost the Bears took on by using the #1 overall pick instead of trading it. Drafting Williams cost the Bears roughly what signing a mid-tier veteran QB would have cost. The cash gap is the structural advantage rookie QB contracts offer.

Running Back

The smallest non-special-teams investment for every team in the division, but with a real spread at the top. Detroit ($30M) is spending almost twice what Chicago ($17M) or Minnesota ($15M) are committing at the position, driven by Jahmyr Gibbs’s #12 overall pick value. The value of that pick annualized in today’s dollars is $18.22 million. Only two veteran backs make more than that.

Three of four teams spending under $25M on RB is consistent with how modern rosters are built. Detroit’s outlier number reflects a specific bet on Gibbs. His next contract should pay him at least that. Detroit bet big on him and that bet paid even money and then some.

Wide Receiver

Tighter than you might expect. All four teams are between $50M and $66M. The division features three first round pick investments still on rookie deals and four veterans making $20 million a year or more.

The Packers ($66M) lead the group on the strength of Jayden Reed ($21.2M cash, an early extension), Christian Watson and Matthew Golden. Detroit ($59M) sits second almost entirely on Amon-Ra St. Brown and Jameson Williams. Minnesota’s $54M is essentially Justin Jefferson plus Jordan Addison. Chicago is the lowest at $50M with Rome Odunze ($22.7M resource value) and Luther Burden III doing most of the work.

The Packers having the highest WR investment in the division is one of the more interesting findings here. The conventional narrative is that Green Bay’s receiver room is young and unproven. The resource commitment says the front office has put significant capital into it anyway. Aaron Rodgers is in shambles right now.

Tight End

Chicago is the clear outlier. The Bears’ $40M tight end room is more than the Lions and Packers combined and well over twice the Vikings’ figure. Cole Kmet’s $10M vet contract plus Colston Loveland’s $21.3M resource value as the #10 overall pick in 2025 do most of that work. Whether it pays off depends on how Loveland develops, but the resource commitment is real.

The other three teams have one significant TE investment apiece (LaPorta in Detroit, Kraft in Green Bay, Hockenson in Minnesota) and not much else.

This is the largest single-position outlier in the division at any group. No other team is investing this much at tight end. Whether it pays off depends on how Loveland develops, but the resource commitment is real. The league is moving more towards 12 and 13 personnel. One of the things I will look back on at the end of this series is a) how much does the average team invest in the position group, and b) if the Bears are an outlier, by how much.

Also of note, Green Bay and Tucker Kraft are working towards an extension this offseason. That would drastically change their investment and push them close to Chicago.

Offensive Line

“Build through the trenches.” You hear it often. The NFC North proves the cliche. It is the most uniform position group in the division. All four teams are within a $14M band ($75M to $89M). Chicago tops the division at $89M, with three trade-acquired vet starters (Thuney, Jonah Jackson, Bradbury) layered over four rookie-deal options (Wright, Trapilo, Amegadjie, Newman).

This roster building strategy raises an obvious question for the framework: should the draft capital given up in trades be accounted for in the valuation? If not the volume sent away, perhaps the net trade-off."

For now, I am leaving it out. But it’s a worthwhile thought exercise.

Green Bay sits at $75M, the lowest in the division, despite Aaron Banks at $18.1M and Sean Rhyan at $14.0M, because Jordan Morgan, Jager Burton, and Anthony Belton are all on cheap rookie deals.

Tight clustering at offensive line tells us this is the position group where the four front offices most agree on what a starting unit should cost. The Bears are slightly heavier on vet cash, the Packers slightly heavier on rookie capital, but the totals come out within $14M of each other.

Defensive Line

Defensive line is the largest single-position investment for every team in the division. But that doesn’t mean every team values the position the same. That’s because it has the widest spread at the top.

The Packers commit $122M to defensive line, which is $36M more than Minnesota at the bottom of the position group. Their margin over the rest of the division single-handedly raises the division average to almost even with the second-highest spending team (Detroit). A third of that Packers number is Micah Parsons ($40.8M) alone, with Lukas Van Ness, Devonte Wyatt, and Javon Hargrave all representing significant investments.

Detroit’s $100M runs through Aidan Hutchinson and Alim McNeill on extensions plus Derrick Moore as a second-round pick. Chicago’s $91M sits on Montez Sweat, Grady Jarrett, Dayo Odeyingbo, and Gervon Dexter. Minnesota’s $86M includes Caleb Banks (#18 overall in 2026), Jonathan Allen, Andrew Van Ginkel, and Dallas Turner.

Every team is spending big on defensive line. Green Bay is spending an unusual amount of big.

Linebacker

Post Tremaine Edmunds' release from the Bears and ahead of a potential long-term extension for Jack Campbell, these four teams are effectively tied across the division. All four teams are between $35M and $40M, the smallest spread of any major position group. Nobody is paying premium money at linebacker (yet). The Packers lead at $40M (Zaire Franklin’s trade contract plus rookie-deal depth) but the gap to the bottom team is just $5M.

This is the position where the four teams have most clearly converged on the same market valuation. But that could soon change.

Secondary

The most striking divergence in the division. Chicago is spending $86M on its secondary. Minnesota is spending $45M. That is nearly a 2:1 ratio between the top and the bottom of the division at the same position group.

Chicago stacks vet cash and rookie pick value at the same time. Jaylon Johnson ($16M), Kyler Gordon ($10.8M), and Coby Bryant ($14M) form a $40.8M veteran backbone. Layered on top: Dillon Thieneman (the #25 overall pick in 2026, $17.5M resource value), Tyrique Stevenson, and Malik Muhammad. Three veterans on second contracts and three recent picks on rookie deals.

Detroit’s $81M is built differently. DJ Reed at $15M, Kerby Joseph at $11.5M (extension) anchor the vet side. Terrion Arnold (#24 in 2024), Brian Branch (R2 2023), and Ennis Rakestraw (R2 2024) supply the rookie capital.

Green Bay’s $67M is mostly Xavier McKinney ($13.4M) and Keisean Nixon ($5M) on the vet side, with Brandon Cisse, Javon Bullard, Evan Williams, and Kitan Oladapo on rookie deals.

Minnesota’s $45M is Byron Murphy ($16M) plus a low-cost rotation of veteran depth. The Vikings have committed less to their secondary than to any other defensive position group, and roughly half what Chicago has committed at the same group.

Two divisional opponents at the same position group, and the resource commitment differs by a factor of nearly two. Vikings defensive coordinator Brian Flores has shown a high success rate at pairing a creative pass rush driven by schematic design with flawed defensive backs who have one or two special traits or skills and getting the most out of them. Murphy is the one DB Minnesota is paying real money. Everyone else is scheme dependent. He is a modern day ‘Moneyball’ application to football. And Minnesota is riding that edge as far as it can take them.

Special Teams

Chicago’s $10M is nearly double every other team in the division at special teams. Tory Taylor’s rookie pick value (#122 overall in 2024) plus Cairo Santos’s vet contract are the bulk of it. Detroit at $5M is the lowest, with Jake Bates on a cheap deal and rookie-deal long-snapping. The other two teams are at $7M apiece.

Small in absolute terms but worth noting: a $5M gap between the top and bottom special teams investments is real money. Chicago’s Tory Taylor pick is the most expensive punter commitment in the division.

Methodology Note

The 53-man rosters are projected from Ourlads depth charts as of May 14, 2026. Rookie pick values are from my proprietary 2026-normalized draft pick value model, annualized over four years. Cash figures are from Spotrac’s 2026 cash tables. UDFAs and players on cap-minimum vet deals are valued at their actual 2026 cash. Players who have signed extensions beyond their original rookie deal are treated as veterans (using cash), not as rookies (using pick value), regardless of whether they were drafted by their current team.

Position groups: QB, RB, WR, TE, OL, DL (IDL + EDGE combined), LB, SEC (CB + S combined), and ST (K, P, LS).

No positional adjustments are applied to pick values. A running back taken at #3 carries the same resource value as a quarterback taken at #3 in this framework. This is a deliberate choice consistent with the goal of measuring resource commitment, not expected return.

What’s Next

Next week I’ll dive into the NFC South, followed by the NFC East, NFC West, AFC North, South, East and West. At the end of the series, I’ll then look for anomalies within the league-wide context in a final look at the league as a whole. If it’s anything like this first divisional look there are peculiar and fascinating team building phenomena to surface in every division. And perhaps a pattern will emerge among perennial playoff contenders.