patfanken

....that is linked to the first one.

I'm thinking that if the owners are willing to give up some aspect of the franchise tag, you'd think the union would have to give up something in order to get it done. Well here's what they should do.....IMHO.

The union and the owners should get together and get the rookie salaries under control. 8 figure GUARANTEES are ridiculous for players chosen in the first round who haven't played a down in the league. The union should be OK with this because the money that isn't going to the rookies would be going to the more veteran players. In fact you could tie in 3 issues here. The franchise tag, the rookie salary structure, and the veteran minimum.

ROOKIE SALARY STRUCTURE - There should be a strict maximum that a player can be signed for IN THEIR FIRST YEAR. It should be something like $2MM for the top pick and work its way down. Each player would be able to negotiate a multi year contract, but the FIRST year would be strictly controlled. In the second and ongoing years the player can negotiate any amount the market will bear based on agreed upon incentives like games played, wins etc. Pretty much like they do now, but AFTER the first year.

Now that you've freed up millions of dollars that the DON'T have to play untried kids who haven't played a down, they can give back that money to the guys who have EARNED it. Raise the Vet minimum a hundred thousand or so, and lower the cap consequence for keeping a minimum wage vet instead of an untried rookie. Its fairer all around.

THis might put a dent in that sense of entitlement that a number of first round rookies walk around with. It might even allow teams to get rid of busts earlier.

Miguel

This presumes that this is not already being done. The percentage amount of the cap that is being taken up by rookies has been going down over the past couple of years and looks to go down this year and next.

How many rookies get 8 million guarantees??
How would you guarantee that??
How much will the last pick get??
If you are not limiting what a rookie deal can reach, then how are you solving this so-called problem??


Can is different than will. If you can't guarantee will, why should the union agree to the deal.
This would cost a lot more than what you allege to have saved. Let's say that there are about 1,000 vets in the league. 1,000 *100,000= 1,000,000,000. The rookie pool this year is around 137,000,000.
Already done in the last CBA.

It's not fairer to a great percentage of the draft picks who will see a decrease in pay.

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mgteich

1) We are not in the middle of CBA negotiations.
2) The franchise is a very low priority item for the union. It affects fewer than 50 of their members each year.
3) Incentives to retain old veterans increase each year, putting younger players out of work. I fully support this.
4) It is never "fairer all around" to take money from one group and give it to another.

mgteich

Miguel,

This is a bit disengenuous. How many veterans receive the vet minimum? No one suggested increasing ALL veteran salaries by $100K. The presumption is that more would be covered, but the relevant number is the difference between the veteran minimum and the current veteran minium multiplied by the number of players who would receive this amount.

Miguel

I may have misunderstood Ken's post then.

The vet min is tied to the minimum salary of a player with two years of service. If you increase that by $100,000, IMO, you have to increase the minimum salaries of players with greater salaries or you run into a situation where a player with two years of service is making more money than a player with more service which is counter to Ken's point.

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patfanken

For example, recently there was a lot of talk about the #3 pick (Thomas) is likely to get a deal with $30MM in guarantees, so how hard is it to extrapolate down the line and infer that there will be guys in the teens who get deals with $10MM+ in guarantees

Now you are getting unfair. You are asking for specifics on a GERM of an idea posted after midnight. As for a possible answer. I would guess the last pick in the first round would get slightly less than a million.

I'm not "solving" the problem, but rather attempting to minimize the risk to the team and the financial IMPACT to them in THE FIRST YEAR. I'm assuming that in the contract teams would put in reasonable benchmarks that a high pick would be expected to meet inorder to get the bigger money in the following years of the contract. Again this is more a concept than a finished product.

This is a valid point. At first I guess, my initial thought was that the more veteran players would get more money through (I can't believe I'm actually saying this) the "trickly down theory" (thanks to RReagan ). Teams like the Pats who spend to the cap, would filter the extra money down to the Vets. However there are a lot of teams who don't think like that so I guess some sort of incentive/punishment would have to be put in place, like an increase in the vet minimum

Again, this is a cheap shot, though in my defense, I bet that there aren't 1000 guys right now who are making the vet minimun, that would be over 30 guys per team making the vet minimum

This only effects a player's first year. A year where, under the current system, 95% of the first round rookies' production NEVER reaches the value of their contract

BelichickFan

I agree with Ken. I don't have a specific proposal for fear that "certain people" will pick it apart for fun but conceptually I think all draft choices should make the league minimum + a little bonus based on where they're drafted with some kind of good paying team option after 1 then 2 years so that a team can get out of a contract scott free but the player gets a chance at big money quickly if he shows he's worth keeping around.

QuiGon

With all due respect, I think you are trying to fix something that simply ain't broke. Just because the Patriots and Asante are having a pissing contest this offseason doesn't mean the entire concept of franchise players needs to be overhauled. Personally I would rather fix what happened last year... IMHO, there should be more serious consequences for a player under contract who refuses to play.

As I mentioned in another post, I don't think there is much desire on the part of the union to get rid of the franchise player designation because the vast majority of players benefit from it.

Miguel

I was thinking that you were talking about the last pick in the entire draft, not the 1st round. Because, IMO, you limit what the top players in the draft make you have to limit what the rest of the players make.


FYI - Most teams, if not all, spend to the cap in the same manner that the Pats do.


This board is getting far too defensive when a misunderstanding is considered a cheap shot.

.

You wrote:"Raise the Vet minimum a hundred thousand or so, and lower the cap consequence for keeping a minimum wage vet instead of an untried rookie."

Let's use Larry Izzo as an example.

"When linebacker Larry Izzo re-signed with the Patriots earlier this week, the deal was a one-year package for $820,000. Izzo receives a $40,000 signing bonus. This contract qualifies for the veteran minimum benefit, meaning that Izzo's salary cap number will be about $482,000."

What would be increased by $100,000??

His actual salary of $820,000. I understood the later because that is the minimum for a veteran with his years of experience.

Or the cap hit of $482,000. If it is this, then you are not lowering the cap consequence but actually increasing it.

If it is neither, then what??

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upstater1

My solution is to offer an incentive for teams to sign their own players by, 1. limiting 1st round contracts for rookies, and 2. allowing teams to pay their own draft picks more when they go into free agency.

So, a team is prepared to offer your guy, say, $5 million.

If yo can offer your own guy $5 million, 10% of it will not count against the cap. So he'll only cost you 4.5 mill in cap terms. This rewards teams that draft well, and develops continuity which the fans appreciate.