Wood
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First let me say I was never really a fan of league parity. I liked it when Dallas & San Fran were juggernauts who butted heads in championship games. Problem was rest of league wasn't having as much fun and growth was limited to these Super Teams and thus salary cap was instituted.
League parity allows teams to quickly pivot and make astonishing turn-arounds in 1-2 year period. For that reason NFL popularity has exploded since hard Salary Cap was implemented. That system worked as long as GMs created flexibility by only paying elite players elite money, signing starters to reasonable contracts and churning bottom third of roster on yearly basis.
However, that stable time period appears to be coming to end. What is happening now is middling QBs (non elite players) are commanding elite money within a limited hard salary cap structure. Meaning teams signing these middling QBs to monster contracts will lose the ability to retain core pieces at expense of retaining these middle of pack QBs. In other words, the opportunity cost of signing these non elite players to elite contracts will increase dramatically.
How I see NFL shaping up is few teams maybe 5 or so who will truly have elite QBs who will challenge for SB (like they always do). The middle of pack teams (paying monster QB contracts) can't out-depth the top teams any longer. And the bad teams will keep drafting QB early but will require time for them to develop.
Teams I see potentially in trouble are: Vikings (Cousins), 49ers (Garoppolo), Cowboys (Prescott), Lions (Stafford) and Raiders (Carr) and possibly Pitts (Big Ben). Following teams will soon be in trouble with this predicament: Chargers (Rivers) and Titans (Mariota).
The only silver lining for Dallas (if Dak gets $30 million year) is that he makes quantum leap as QB then contract is fine. If he doesn't, Cowboy will be consistently be bubble playoff team who gets bounced early in playoffs because they won't have depth of roster to off-set a more highly skilled team at QB.
League parity allows teams to quickly pivot and make astonishing turn-arounds in 1-2 year period. For that reason NFL popularity has exploded since hard Salary Cap was implemented. That system worked as long as GMs created flexibility by only paying elite players elite money, signing starters to reasonable contracts and churning bottom third of roster on yearly basis.
However, that stable time period appears to be coming to end. What is happening now is middling QBs (non elite players) are commanding elite money within a limited hard salary cap structure. Meaning teams signing these middling QBs to monster contracts will lose the ability to retain core pieces at expense of retaining these middle of pack QBs. In other words, the opportunity cost of signing these non elite players to elite contracts will increase dramatically.
How I see NFL shaping up is few teams maybe 5 or so who will truly have elite QBs who will challenge for SB (like they always do). The middle of pack teams (paying monster QB contracts) can't out-depth the top teams any longer. And the bad teams will keep drafting QB early but will require time for them to develop.
Teams I see potentially in trouble are: Vikings (Cousins), 49ers (Garoppolo), Cowboys (Prescott), Lions (Stafford) and Raiders (Carr) and possibly Pitts (Big Ben). Following teams will soon be in trouble with this predicament: Chargers (Rivers) and Titans (Mariota).
The only silver lining for Dallas (if Dak gets $30 million year) is that he makes quantum leap as QB then contract is fine. If he doesn't, Cowboy will be consistently be bubble playoff team who gets bounced early in playoffs because they won't have depth of roster to off-set a more highly skilled team at QB.