NFL Penalizing Salary Cap for Cowboys and Commanders

[AdamJT13]

It looks like they are just converting the difference between Austin's Year1 salary of $17m and Year2 salary of $1.5m into a signing bonus and spreading it out over the rest of the contract. Not really a punishment, but more of a correction.

Austin's Year 2 base salary was $8.54 million.

 

[cowboy_ron]

Goodell is a human buzzkill

 

[SkinsFan82]

How much were the Cowboys under the cap prior to this garbage?

Just curious, while the Commanders got hit *huge*, I was wondering which team it will impact more.

 

[The Quest for Six]

cowboys can split the 10 million over the next two years, 2012 ,2013

 

[Nightman]

The ONLY contract that we frontloaded in 2010 was Miles Austin's, and his contract still complied with the 50% down rule (his 2010 "cap" number was $17,078,000, and his 2011 cap number was $8,540,000). A few other cap numbers were barely higher in 2010 than in 2011.

Meanwhile, several other teams frontloaded contracts and will not be penalized at all.

The Packers, for instance, renegotiated Tramon Williams' contract late in the uncapped season to make his base salary more than $37 million. He got 1/17th of that each week for the last five weeks of the season, giving him a "cap" number of $15,043,000 that season. In 2011, when the cap returned, his cap number was $5.6 million -- barely more than one-third of the 2010 figure. The Packers also gave Nick Collins a roster bonus of $8.3 million in the uncapped year to give him a "cap" number of $10.95 million. The next year, when the cap returned, his cap number was only $5.18 million -- less than half. The same with Ryan Picket, but with a smaller bonus ($6,437,500) and smaller cap numbers ($8.44 million in 2010, only $4.21 million in 2011). The same with BJ Raji -- $5,222,500 roster bonus, $7.89 million in 2010, only $3.06 million in 2011. Apparently, it was perfectly OK for them to dump money into the uncapped year.

Note to self: Remember to wait until Adam replies

 

[TellerMorrow34]

This honestly makes me almost not want to even watch the NFL this year. If I wasn't such a Cowboys fan I can honestly say I'd likely not watch a single game this season.

There's a great chance I won't watch any of them outside of Cowboys games this year though.

 

[SDogo]

Adam you don't make it easy to keep a cool head. lol

 

[Arch Stanton]

What'd they do wrong? Well, they apparently violated no actual rule but rather a behind-the-scenes guideline designed to keep the uncapped year from truly being uncapped.

While the 2010 season was an uncapped year, the NFL told teams not to use that as a means of eating up portions of long-term contracts in order to reduce cap room in future years. The Commanders and Cowboys and, to a lesser extent, the Raiders and Saints, were found to have done just this. As a result, not only do they lose this money, but every NFL team other than Oakland and New Orleans gets an additional $1.6 million in cap room. (The Saints and Raiders aren't docked any cap room, they just don't get to share in what the Commanders and Cowboys have to give back.)

This seems a pretty ridiculous thing for the league to do. Either the year is uncapped or it's not. To tell teams, "Yeah, it's uncapped, but don't spend too much this year just because of that, or we'll fine you for it down the road" feels a little bit like collusion to me. But this is the NFL, which does what it wants and makes up the rules as it goes along. The Cowboys and the Commanders surely know that, and the fact that they were the only two teams found to have engaged egregiously enough in this behavior to deserve a huge loss of salary-cap space indicates that they should have known better. I mean, when you're found to be dirtier than the Raiders and the Saints, you kind of have to look in the mirror and re-think the way you're doing business.

Read more:http://espn.go.com/blog/nflnation/post/_/id/54985/cowboys-Commanders-punished-but-why?

 

[cowboysooner]

The ONLY contract that we frontloaded in 2010 was Miles Austin's, and his contract still complied with the 50% down rule (his 2010 "cap" number was $17,078,000, and his 2011 cap number was $8,540,000). A few other cap numbers were barely higher in 2010 than in 2011.

Meanwhile, several other teams frontloaded contracts and will not be penalized at all.

The Packers, for instance, renegotiated Tramon Williams' contract late in the uncapped season to make his base salary more than $37 million. He got 1/17th of that each week for the last five weeks of the season, giving him a "cap" number of $15,043,000 that season. In 2011, when the cap returned, his cap number was $5.6 million -- barely more than one-third of the 2010 figure. The Packers also gave Nick Collins a roster bonus of $8.3 million in the uncapped year to give him a "cap" number of $10.95 million. The next year, when the cap returned, his cap number was only $5.18 million -- less than half. The same with Ryan Picket, but with a smaller bonus ($6,437,500) and smaller cap numbers ($8.44 million in 2010, only $4.21 million in 2011). The same with BJ Raji -- $5,222,500 roster bonus, $7.89 million in 2010, only $3.06 million in 2011. Apparently, it was perfectly OK for them to dump money into the uncapped year.

This and 15 other examples will be why this would not pass muster in court. The question is do the Cowboys and Commanders want to bother being painted as outlaws.

The other side of this is we waited to cut veterans when the bonus accelerated onto the cap. Had we done it in 2010 like many teams, we would have very little dead money. It seems to me that with the dead money we have by respecting the rules, we are being penalized on both ends.

 

[DasTex]

Well, now I'm pissed again...:grrr:

Yup,was backing down from the edge, and now I'm cannon balling off the side

 

[TNCowboy]

PFT:

Per a source with knowledge of the situation, the teams were told “at least six times” during ownership-level meetings that there would be “serious consequences” for any team that used the uncapped year as an occasion to dump salaries.

The Cowboys and Commanders engaged in “systematic dumping” of salaries into the uncapped year, despite the warnings.

 

[RS12]

It's pretty simple, you have a bunch of small market and tight fisted owners who saw the big market/big money guys throwing around a bunch of cash on the front end in an uncapped year and got angry.

No, more to the point they want a cut.

 

[boysfanindc]

PFT:

Per a source with knowledge of the situation, the teams were told “at least six times” during ownership-level meetings that there would be “serious consequences” for any team that used the uncapped year as an occasion to dump salaries.

The Cowboys and Commanders engaged in “systematic dumping” of salaries into the uncapped year, despite the warnings.

Don't believe it was about dumping it was about front loading.

 

[The Emperor]

Aren't we the only expansion team that didn't get to participate in the draft prior to their inaugural season?

Yeah, so, I'm not shocked what the NFL does to us. You can blame Jerry Jones or fake moon landings if you like, but we've been unfairly singled out at times going back to 1960. History doesn't repeat; it rhymes.

 

[firehawk350]

How much were the Cowboys under the cap prior to this garbage?

Just curious, while the Commanders got hit *huge*, I was wondering which team it will impact more.

If you include the tag for Spencer, you get something like $5M. Obviously, the Cowboys can opt to take the entire $10M in 2013 and they'd still have room to sign guys...

The Skins had $47M and if they take their lumps now, they'd end up with $11M in space (they just cut Atogwe and Sellers which supposedly freed up a couple mil). If the Skins distribute the hits equally, obviously there's ~$30M in cap space which is more than enough to do quite a bit without gutting the team or making knee-jerk restructure decisions.

 

[BRAVEONAWARPATH]

https://twitter.com/#!/adbrandt

Andrew Brandt ‏

The "Uncapped League Year" article in previous CBA makes no mention of any warning to teams. Sense that push for this came from teams.

Andrew Brandt ‏

Again, no written warnings about loading uncapped year, but verbal warnings on "abusing uncapped year." Owners pushed for punishment.

 

[Yakuza Rich]

PFT:

Per a source with knowledge of the situation, the teams were told “at least six times” during ownership-level meetings that there would be “serious consequences” for any team that used the uncapped year as an occasion to dump salaries.

The Cowboys and Commanders engaged in “systematic dumping” of salaries into the uncapped year, despite the warnings.

Where is the legitimate 'systematic dumping' of salaries by Dallas?










YR

 

[Hoofbite]

Julius Peppers had a base salary of 20M.

It then dropped to 900K.

Now it's at 8.9M

How does that not count?

 

[cowboy_ron]

The ONLY contract that we frontloaded in 2010 was Miles Austin's, and his contract still complied with the 50% down rule (his 2010 "cap" number was $17,078,000, and his 2011 cap number was $8,540,000). A few other cap numbers were barely higher in 2010 than in 2011.

Meanwhile, several other teams frontloaded contracts and will not be penalized at all.

The Packers, for instance, renegotiated Tramon Williams' contract late in the uncapped season to make his base salary more than $37 million. He got 1/17th of that each week for the last five weeks of the season, giving him a "cap" number of $15,043,000 that season. In 2011, when the cap returned, his cap number was $5.6 million -- barely more than one-third of the 2010 figure. The Packers also gave Nick Collins a roster bonus of $8.3 million in the uncapped year to give him a "cap" number of $10.95 million. The next year, when the cap returned, his cap number was only $5.18 million -- less than half. The same with Ryan Picket, but with a smaller bonus ($6,437,500) and smaller cap numbers ($8.44 million in 2010, only $4.21 million in 2011). The same with BJ Raji -- $5,222,500 roster bonus, $7.89 million in 2010, only $3.06 million in 2011. Apparently, it was perfectly OK for them to dump money into the uncapped year.

So what do you make of all this Adam?

 

[TNCowboy]

Don't believe it was about dumping it was about front loading.

Just quoting Florio. I think its safe to say he knows more about it than any of us.