An honest debate about the salary cap

[UKTexans]

3 hours ago, ChazStandard said:

What an idiot.

The salary cap is great idea, it keeps the playing field level, and I wish other sports would do the same. Soccer being a great example.

Wouldn't work in soccer. The NFL is a closed market monopoly. There are no substitute markets and the 32 owners are all part of the collective. 

[Hunter2_1]

3 minutes ago, texans_uk said:

Wouldn't work in soccer. The NFL is a closed market monopoly. There are no substitute markets and the 32 owners are all part of the collective. 

There are 'financial fair play' rules, but they are largely ignored. Soccer.Is.Corrupt.

[UKTexans]

8 minutes ago, Hunter2_1 said:

There are 'financial fair play' rules, but they are largely ignored. Soccer.Is.Corrupt.

FFP is nothing like the cap though. It limits expenditure based on revenue. So in practice the huge clubs can still throw hundreds of millions around whilst those struggling to compete are punished for overspending by a fraction of that. 

If you had FFP in the NFL it would allow the franchises with the largest turnovers to outspend those at the bottom end by 2:1 in some cases. 

[Hunter2_1]

7 minutes ago, texans_uk said:

FFP is nothing like the cap though. It limits expenditure based on revenue. So in practice the huge clubs can still throw hundreds of millions around whilst those struggling to compete are punished for overspending by a fraction of that. 

If you had FFP in the NFL it would allow the franchises with the largest turnovers to outspend those at the bottom end by 2:1 in some cases. 

I know, I didn't say it was similar. Just highlighting that their idea of financial policing is laughable. 

There is one thing that I think the NFL cap nullifies; maintaining dominance. Pats have done their best to rubbish this, but if a team has the best coaching, makes the best of their roster and SHOULD dominate for years, it's very hard with the cap. Take Man United in soccer; it's right that they should have dominated the early 2000s because they had the best manager, and used players and strategy (and other means) intelligently. (Now it all comes down to money).

Most people probably don't want to see that, but for me, it comes across as manufactured if teams go from 4-12 to 10-6 in one season. 

[broncos67]

For parity purposes alone it's an excellent premise. I love baseball, but small market teams simply can't be competitive in that type of environment. I'd hate for that kind of thing to happen in the NFL because IMO it would totally neuter the caliber of product. You may have bad teams in the league, but with a hard cap it can turn around in fairly short order. That parity is good for the game.

As for wage suppression, that's nonsense. 

[Hunter2_1]

9 minutes ago, broncos67 said:

 You may have bad teams in the league, but with a hard cap it can turn around in fairly short order. That parity is good for the game.

 

It is good for the game, and it's especially good for those who support bad teams. It's not good, however, if you're a supporter of a team that finally won something, because you're expecting it to not last. It's like bitter-sweet, constantly. Even a Pats fan, I never expect to repeat a SB. It also encourages things like tanking, which is worse than any "unsportsmanlike conduct" seen in the league.

Overall though, it's definitely the best policy. The alternative, as soccer has shown, is unpalatable. 

[UKTexans]

39 minutes ago, Hunter2_1 said:

Take Man United in soccer; it's right that they should have dominated the early 2000s because they had the best manager, and used players and strategy (and other means) intelligently. (Now it all comes down to money).

A lot of that dominance also came down to financial power. 

United broke the transfer record countless times during the 90s and early 2000s. Oil money just took it to a whole other level. 

[Hunter2_1]

1 minute ago, texans_uk said:

A lot of that dominance also came down to financial power. 

United broke the transfer record countless times during the 90s and early 2000s. Oil money just took it to a whole other level. 

True. I forget the United of the noughties were pretty much the Chelsea of now. But with more success.

[Crickett]

While a salary cap in theory promotes competitiveness, in reality the effect is more limited than we would think. The reason why is it still requires teams to be competent.  It requires teams to be competent in their hiring practices.  They need to be good at drafting and they need to know who to sign and who to let go and when.  It gives teams the opportunity to unload dead weight and try again more easily than larger guaranteed contracts, but if your front office just going to screw up in new and exciting ways, you're still not competitive.  

Not to pick on New York teams..... okay that's a lie, but you look at a league like the NBA: The New York Knicks do not have a competent GM and they haven't in well over a decade.  As a result, they are not a competitive team and haven't been in a long time.  Now compare that to an NFL team in the same market even: The New York Jets do not have a competent GM and they haven't in well over a decade.  As a result, they are not a competitive team and haven't been in a long time.  If you've got an owner who doesn't know what he's doing, hires a general manager who doesn't know what he's doing and a head coach who doesn't know what he's doing, you're not going to be competitive.  It doesn't matter what structure the league has, you're not going to compete. 

 

Just the same, I am in favor of a salary cap.  In the NBA, you have two teams that meet in the finals every year to the complete exclusion of everyone else.  Even someone like myself who doesn't watch the NBA and knows very little about the league knew last year's finals would consist of the Golden State Warriors vs. the Cleveland Cavaliers before the season even started.  The NFL needs to do whatever it can to prevent that kind of situation and if that includes a salary cap to make sure one team can't outspend everyone else, then the league needs to keep that implemented.  Otherwise, revenue drops and teams have less money to hire people. 

 

At the end of the day, I think it's best for all parties involved if every team in league has a salary cap.  The league would be worse if five teams had four hundred million each to spend and the rest of the league had 50-80 million per team and there would be less money to go around for the players themselves. 

[Malik]

1 hour ago, Hunter2_1 said:

I believe QB money (% of the team, not net amount) is justified. It's unfathomable how much they have on their plate at any one time. A lot more than a running back, say. Even learning their playbook like the back of their hand is a harder job than most occupations, let alone putting it into practice.

Mediocre QBs who amount to nothing deserve more than other players at other positions that actually turn out to be great?

 

Also on "parity" there is as much parity in the MLB as in the NFL despite the fact that it's exponentially longer and has to have series to decide its winners in their playoff system. The only thing the NFL does right is actually having a salary floor. If they didn't have that than we would see some truly awful intentionally undertalented teams when front offices decide to tank or just when owners don't care about being competitive.  Yes, there is wage suppression too. Just because they make exponentially more money than any of us makes doesn't mean their wages can't be suppressed. They bring in significantly more money than any of us as will as having a significantly more niche and hard to find skill set.

[BroncoSojia]

 For the people saying it's not wage suppression, all you have to do is look at the name. "Salary Cap" It's literally a cap on what so many players can earn on a certain team. You have fans and FOs alike arguing for elite players to take less money to help their respective teams stay under the cap .

Then you have players being called greedy and selfish for just trying to get their market value. It's a screwed up system.

[lancerman]

In a sport with a shortened season and single elimination playoff it is perfect. If you didn't have a salary cap, Allen/Jones/Khan/Kroenke (actually the bigger issue would be Jones and Kraft where more of their money is tied up in football tbh) would be able to put up a fortune to get Aaron Rodgers away from the Packers who could never compete with that type of money and they'd be relegated to bottom feeder status while which ever team lands Rodgers could probably afford a top 3 WR, a top 3 TE, a top 3 LB a top 3 LB corp, a top 3 defensive line corp. Oh and then the other teams that would do that would be able to land Tom Brady or Matt Ryan or Derek Carr. 

Really think about it. Teams like the Broncos, Steelers, and Raiders would never be able to compete again.

[lancerman]

1 hour ago, BroncoSojia said:

 For the people saying it's not wage suppression, all you have to do is look at the name. "Salary Cap" It's literally a cap on what so many players can earn on a certain team. You have fans and FOs alike arguing for elite players to take less money to help their respective teams stay under the cap .

Then you have players being called greedy and selfish for just trying to get their market value. It's a screwed up system.

Think of it this way. The top 5 or 6 at every position gets a fortune. The rest of them get far less or next to nothing. The best player on the worst team might get less than the worst player on the best team.  It would eventually become a system where the owners who couldn't compete would just give up and you'd have a 5-10 teams that didn't matter anymore.

[Hunter2_1]

2 hours ago, Malik said:

Mediocre QBs who amount to nothing deserve more than other players at other positions that actually turn out to be great?

 

 

Whilst they have the job, yes. As I said, they have to do SO much more than any other position in any other sport. If you're poor at your job (in most occupations) you still get paid. You might get fired, but whilst you're there, you get a wage. 

[bucsfan333]

Football would suck without a salary cap.