Obviously this will all be completely irrelevant if the NFL and the NFLPA cannot resolve their other differences and sign off on a new collective bargaining agreement, but nevertheless Yahoo! Sports reports that the NFL and the NFLPA have reached a tentative agreement on a rookie wage scale. Per Jason Cole:
While the NFL Players Association and owners remain far apart on the most critical issue – how to split approximately $9 billion in revenues – the two sides have reached agreements on a couple of smaller issues.
According to two sources familiar with the negotiations, the league and the union have reached a basic compromise on a rookie wage scale that will replace the current rookie salary cap. The owners backed off the idea of requiring first-round picks to sign five-year deals, instead limiting the contracts to four years before a player could become a free agent. The agreement is also expected to include a stipulation limiting the amount of guaranteed money and signing bonus offered to draft picks.
In addition, the league agreed that all players drafted after the first round would be limited to three-year deals, but teams would be allowed to put restricted free agent tags after the three years. That’s essentially similar to the current process where players can be tagged as restricted free agents after a three-year deal, although the existing rule allows players drafted after the first round to sign four-year pacts.
Aside from the fact that this latest news makes it at least somewhat more likely that the two sides will ultimately be able to reach an agreement in the coming months, this confirms what most have felt to be an imminent development for some time now. 50 million guaranteed is just entirely too much money for owners to give to an entirely unproven guy who has never played a snap in the NFL and who may wash out in three years, purple drank in hand, and it's just entirely too much money that should otherwise be paid to quality NFL players. At some point that reality was going to be integrated into a CBA, and it looks like that time is now.
Regarding specifics, though, this one is too early to evaluate. Again, the whole deal may fall through and make this temporary meeting of the minds irrelevant, and in any event we don't know yet exactly what the caps will be. The owners originally offered the #1 overall pick a five-year, 19 million dollar contract with six million guaranteed -- no chance in hell that one was ever going to happen -- and while it's clear that they likely agreed to some number far north of that, the exact specifics aren't known. A year ago Sam Bradford inked a six-year deal for 50 million dollars guaranteed, so there is a massive amount of room for the parties to negotiate somewhere in the middle on the specifics here. Until some hard figures leak out, it's really impossible to say anything definitive about this agreement.
In any event, regardless of the specifics and even if the rookie wage scale is implemented, it remains questionable as to the impact that this will have on the college game. Many have simply assumed that the smaller initial paychecks will lead more players to return for their senior year of college football, but that's possibly an erroneous assumption and the end result could just as easily work otherwise. In actuality, we might see more players leaving early because there will be a smaller financial reward for returning and raising your draft stock, and because more emphasis will be placed on reaching the league at the youngest age possible so you can cash in on free agency sooner rather than later. Long story short, there are still a lot of variables out there, and no one really knows exactly how this will impact the college game if the rookie wage scale is implemented.
http://www.rollbamaroll.com/2011/3/9/2040712/yahoo-sports-nfl-nflpa-reach-deal-on-rookie-wage-scale
While the NFL Players Association and owners remain far apart on the most critical issue – how to split approximately $9 billion in revenues – the two sides have reached agreements on a couple of smaller issues.
According to two sources familiar with the negotiations, the league and the union have reached a basic compromise on a rookie wage scale that will replace the current rookie salary cap. The owners backed off the idea of requiring first-round picks to sign five-year deals, instead limiting the contracts to four years before a player could become a free agent. The agreement is also expected to include a stipulation limiting the amount of guaranteed money and signing bonus offered to draft picks.
In addition, the league agreed that all players drafted after the first round would be limited to three-year deals, but teams would be allowed to put restricted free agent tags after the three years. That’s essentially similar to the current process where players can be tagged as restricted free agents after a three-year deal, although the existing rule allows players drafted after the first round to sign four-year pacts.
Aside from the fact that this latest news makes it at least somewhat more likely that the two sides will ultimately be able to reach an agreement in the coming months, this confirms what most have felt to be an imminent development for some time now. 50 million guaranteed is just entirely too much money for owners to give to an entirely unproven guy who has never played a snap in the NFL and who may wash out in three years, purple drank in hand, and it's just entirely too much money that should otherwise be paid to quality NFL players. At some point that reality was going to be integrated into a CBA, and it looks like that time is now.
Regarding specifics, though, this one is too early to evaluate. Again, the whole deal may fall through and make this temporary meeting of the minds irrelevant, and in any event we don't know yet exactly what the caps will be. The owners originally offered the #1 overall pick a five-year, 19 million dollar contract with six million guaranteed -- no chance in hell that one was ever going to happen -- and while it's clear that they likely agreed to some number far north of that, the exact specifics aren't known. A year ago Sam Bradford inked a six-year deal for 50 million dollars guaranteed, so there is a massive amount of room for the parties to negotiate somewhere in the middle on the specifics here. Until some hard figures leak out, it's really impossible to say anything definitive about this agreement.
In any event, regardless of the specifics and even if the rookie wage scale is implemented, it remains questionable as to the impact that this will have on the college game. Many have simply assumed that the smaller initial paychecks will lead more players to return for their senior year of college football, but that's possibly an erroneous assumption and the end result could just as easily work otherwise. In actuality, we might see more players leaving early because there will be a smaller financial reward for returning and raising your draft stock, and because more emphasis will be placed on reaching the league at the youngest age possible so you can cash in on free agency sooner rather than later. Long story short, there are still a lot of variables out there, and no one really knows exactly how this will impact the college game if the rookie wage scale is implemented.
http://www.rollbamaroll.com/2011/3/9/2040712/yahoo-sports-nfl-nflpa-reach-deal-on-rookie-wage-scale
