All the cut him talk supposes the team cares more about our salary cap than dropping 1.5 million dollars with no chance of lessening that cost. Since our owners presumably care about 1.5 million dollars, it behooves them to keep him on the team until they can find someone to pay some acceptable portion of that cost.
It's a sunk cost, we are spending it either way. You probably cut him even if you don't replace him, just for the flexibility.