The Steel Tradition

Payout’s a b!@$#

By Mike Frazer | May 22nd, 2008

There’s been a big ruckus the last few days over two things: 1) the NFL owners opted out of the current Collective Bargaining Agreement early, and 2) rookie Matt Ryan is now guaranteed more money per season than Tom Brady. And finally – finally! — the Players’ Association is realizing how bad this is hurting their cause. Well, everyone except the guy running the show, one Gene Upshaw.

Upshaw has been in charge of the NFLPA for about 30 years, and in that time salaries have skyrocketed. Rightly so, to a point; collectively, they are being paid on par with most businesses, as around 65 percent of revenue is paid out to the players. They are, after all, the ones solely responsible for the money. The problem lies in the distribution of said wealth: when rookies are guaranteed $30 million or more on a six-year contract, while long-time starters like Super Bowl XL MVP Hines Ward aren’t making nearly that kind of scratch, there’s clearly something broken in the system.

Upshaw has had a long-held, steadfast insistence that the union will not waver from its stance. His argument is that, by giving rookies high salaries, it enables vets to ask for even more. The flaw in his logic is that the monetary allowances for player salaries have a limit: it’s called the salary cap. When you have a high-end cap on what you can spend on salaries, it means that every dollar you give one player has to be removed from the payroll some place else. Unfortunately, it’s usually from veterans who allow their salaries to be restructured, knowing they aren’t going to be signed by another team at their age. Instead of rewarding guys for their loyalty to both the league and to their team, the methodology Upshaw encourages is penalizing guys more the longer they play.

The easiest way to fix it would be to have a set table that teams have to follow for rookie contracts: picks one through 11 are paid X dollars, 12 through 22 receive Y, and 23 through 32 get Z. All the way through all the rounds. It has the added benefit of not making rookies hire agents until they are actually on a team.

I believe, however, that it should be a two-pronged retooling of the current way of defining salaries and the salary cap: veteran salaries count 90 percent against the cap for four- to seven-year guys, and anyone from eight years on counts 75 percent. Based on that concept, Alan Faneca may actually have been affordable, especially considering how many starters on the team will be at least 30 by the time the season starts (I can think of at least five on defense right now: Aaron Smith, Casey Hampton, Brett Keisel — the entire defensive line right there — James Farrior and Deshea Townsend). Teams could further sweeten the deals by backloading long contracts, giving more money after the player crosses the four- or eight-year threshold.

The nice part about an idea like this is that it makes a player truly earn his money. Guys like Ryan Leaf won’t be able to collect a ton of money only to wind up a complete dud. After all, I’ve worked for 10 years to get the salary I make now. Why should football players be any different?

it initially seemed that the players would maintain the upperhand in negotiations on a new CBA. Now, it looks like the owners have a new chip to wager: many in the union, including president Kevin Mawae — a 15-year veteran — realize that Upshaw’s leadership has led to the vets being short-changed, and want to see things change.

The first change needed, though, is going to be a hard one: firing Gene Upshaw.

This entry was posted on Thursday, May 22nd, 2008 at 11:44 am and is filed under NFLPA, Salary Cap, Opinion. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.

10 Responses to “Payout’s a b!@$#”

MBlaster says:

May 22nd, 2008 at 12:14 pm

Gene Upshaw makes from 4-6 million dollars per year as the head of the NFL Players Association and that doesn’t include perks. That, in itself, is a travesty.

Given Mawae’s stance and the recent statement made by John Lynch indicating that he’s all for a rookie cap clearly shows that Upshaw is out of touch with his constituents.

I’m all for a cap since it makes absolutely no sense what so ever to pay a rookie a king’s ransom based purely on speculation.
fred says:

May 22nd, 2008 at 12:52 pm

rookie salary cap will be a great thing, unproven rookies should not be getting more than proven veterens, also heard they may be getting a extra game 17 regular season games and i belive 3 preseason games so it generates a lil more revenue for the teams and also takes 1 meaningless game away
carlos anderson says:

May 22nd, 2008 at 1:27 pm

I TOTALLY AGREE WITH A ROOKIE CAP, AS LONG AS THE LEFT OVER MONEY IS DIVIDED UP BETWEEN THE VETERAN PLAYERS ON YOUR TEAM…..I’VE ALWAYS HATED HOW TEAMS COULDN’T KEEP PLAYERS THEY WANTED BECAUSE OF THE CONSTRAINTS OF THE SALARY CAP
rob says:

May 22nd, 2008 at 4:01 pm

But football prospects have to wait 3 or 4 years longer than athletes in other team sports to start making their living. Adrian Petersen was the best player in the league at his position last season on offense, and Patrick Willis was the best at his postion on defense. The reason they could step right in and dominate is that they spent 3 or 4 years playing at the college level when they would likely have been good enough to play in the NFL LeBron James and Sidney Crosby are dominating their respective sports, but if they were football players, they would still be living in dorms and eating at the cafeteria, working part time for spending money.
Webbie says:

May 23rd, 2008 at 6:49 am

I agree with a rookie cap loaded with performance incentives. I dont think if you give top 3 or 4 draft picks 2 or 3 million in garenteed money instead of 30/40 like Russell, Ryan, will need a part time job. Fans are the ones paying for all these high salarys. Right now with gas prices where they are, its kind hard to spend $20 in gas to go buy a $25-$30 hat.
Tmac says:

May 23rd, 2008 at 7:52 am

Yeah Rob I’m really worried about the plight of young professional football players. The system is so messed up that we the fans think its okay that Ben got a 100 million dollar contract. The players should get a lion’s share of the money I just think the pie is a little too big.
MBlaster says:

May 23rd, 2008 at 8:01 am

Rob, there’s an easy solution to the rookie salary issue: Performance Incentives. Make them earn their second contract.

Giving a rookie 30+million dollars, GUARANTEED, is counter productive. Where’s the incentive to work hard when a 23 year old rookie knows he’s set for life? Arthur Blank made a huge tactical mistake. It’s not like he drafted Peyton Manning. He drafted a guy that many felt was a second and even third round talent.
Dave B. says:

May 27th, 2008 at 11:46 am

Yup MBlaster, if Matt flops, the Falcons have damaged themselves under the salary cap. He does have a great attitude and demeanor about him from what I can tell and honestly, I think he will do well. But, he is being paid TOP 5 QB money and certainly does not deserve that at this point.

Wonder how he got that deal so quickly. It seems like Arthur Blank just caved and was afraid to negotiate.
MBlaster says:

May 27th, 2008 at 12:39 pm

IMO, the reason why the deal got done so quickly was based solely on Blank’s desire to exorcise his clubs tattered image and to rid them of the nasty aftertaste stemming from last year’s negative publicity surrounding Michael Vick and his dogfighting business.
Mike Frazer says:

May 30th, 2008 at 9:30 am

That’s exactly it. Blank knew that Mike Vick was still the face of the organization, and that would be like a bank claiming Babyface Nelson as its prized customer. Getting Matt Ryan signed to a contract quickly gave them a new face, even if it did cost them the price of a tank of premium gas the size of Rhode Island. I wouldn’t be surprised if the contract included organ donations from the Blank family in the event that Matt needed a kidney or something.