restructuring is good for the player, bad for the team. the player still gets the same money, just changed to a bonus instead of salary, so they get it earlier. but for the team, the cap hit that was to be for one year, is now split over multiple years.
the 2 instances where restructuring benefits the team is:
1. the player also takes a paycut
2. the player was in the last year of his contract for a large amount, like Jake right now. you add years to his contract, change his 2012 salary to a bonus and thereby spread out the large hit to smaller hits and lock him up longer term.
and cutting players also causes dead money to cost against the cap, which is another negative for the team. look at Indy right now, they cut so many guys they are now showing nearly 37mill in dead money against their cap.