Yardbarker

Yardbarker

Tuesday, April 29, 2008

NFL Rookie Max salary

The Counselor is IN:

Another NFL Draft has come and gone. There are several more rich young men from huge contracts of the first round picks. The majority of the money is given out to the top of the draft. The number 1 over all pick, OT Jake Long, is now the highest paid offensive lineman and he has not even stepped on the field for practice yet. Teams can not trade out of the top slot because no team wants the expense of the number one pick. This is crazy money for these players.

I believe that a Rookie contracts should be limited in some form of a Rookie Maximum cap. The top picks should get paid much better than a seventh round pick but should not be the highest paid player at that position. This would also help player to get signed and into camp. NFL Commissioner Roger S. Goodell agreed with this idea last week on Mike and Mike in the Morning. I know that the NBA has a similar cap with their rookies.

National Football League Players' Association leader Gene Upshaw does not agree. Below are his comments on this idea.

Every spring, the buzz from general managers is, 'We need to fix rookie compensation.' We addressed this issue by limiting rookie pool growth and fixing the maximum number of years a rookie could sign. The length of contracts severely limits players’ ability to move money into future years. What the media doesn’t report is that the rookie pool is part of the overall salary cap, and a player is only a rookie for one season. Clubs want the players to pay for mistakes teams make in drafting. We’ll never agree to a rookie wage scale in such a short-career sport. (NFL)

If there was a fix to the rookie compensation, then the teams would need to pay their veterans more. The overall salary cap would remain the same but teams could afford to compensate their own players better. This may actually help players to remain with one team longer.

This idea makes too much sense to me. It would be smart utilization of limited resources and cap money. I would think more union members would want to help their compensation rather than a few rookies.

The Counselor is OUT:

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