There might not be someone who has been a bigger part of the New Orleans Saints’ success over the last decade while getting less than his share of the credit than Khai Harley. Officially titled the team’s vice president of football administration, Harley’s day-to-day responsibilities focus on navigating salary cap hurdles to ensure the Saints are fielding as competitive a team possible. He spoke about his role on the team and his future ambitions in an extended sit-down interview with FOX 8’s Sean Fazende.
“The main crux of my job is managing the cap, is negotiating player contracts. It’s also somewhat like being a compliance offer, there’s a rule for practically everything we do,” Harley said.
There’s a common belief that the salary cap is a myth, but Harley’s stance on it is more nuanced — he sees it as a challenge to overcome and a tool to be used, rather than a blockade or excuse to keep the Saints from achieving their goals.
He continued, clarifying his perspective on the cap: “Everyone looks at the salary cap in sort of this illusionary sort of way, and yet I look at it as more of an accounting mechanism. So my accounting background with these gap principles that you use in accounting, and you have the CBA that guides salary cap construction, or contract construction.”
It’s an interesting stance, and it isn’t for everyone. The Saints routinely lead the league in dead money paid out in contracts for players who aren’t on their roster anymore, often leading the NFL in restructured contracts to move money around and fit everyone under cap. General manager Mickey Loomis has spoken about an eagerness to get back to more conventional spending habits and stop kicking the can so far down the road. But if an opportunity to improve presents itself, it’s up to Harley to weigh the pros and cons in making a move.
“Can we make it work? So, that’s the difference between probabilities and possibilities,” Harley mused. “It’s possible we can make it work. Should we, that’s a different story, that’s a different question. All things that we discuss internally when we paint the picture of ‘Here’s where we’re at, here’s what we can fit in.’ If everybody likes this particular player, and we want to get this particular player, okay, ‘Here’s how we can make it work, and here’s the consequence of that.'”
But Harley doesn’t want to stay in this gig forever. He left a career in finance administration in hopes of leading his own team someday, and he sees a general manager post of his own in his future. He’s participated in league events highlighting potential GM candidates and seen coworkers like Ryan Pace and Terry Fontenot get hired away to head up the front office in other cities. It’s only a matter of time until another team takes a serious interest in the man who’s kept the Saints’ books clean.
