Proposition: McClay would be regarded as an NFL Einstein if they'd standardize players' pay

[Rockport]

So, let's think about that...

In your world, you would rather forego the chance at a microscopic shot at $5m+ per year... for a nanometric (eensy-teensy) shot at becoming a $40-$60m athlete.

Okay. I just don't think like that.

You want to pay a punter the same as a QB?

 

[KingCorcoran]

When does the CBA expire? I’d be surprised if there aren’t major changes once it does. May result in a lockout.

March 2031.

 

[_sturt_]

You want to pay a punter the same as a QB?

Yes.

Absolutely.

Reasons explained in this very thread, of course. (Mainly on the first page.)

I would only amend my previous thoughts by proposing that there could be a mechanism that pays out slightly more based on seniority... it is typical, after all, that pay scales will look at experience. Could be... doesn't have to be. Worth chewing on, anyway.

Won't happen. But should. Just as we will never have a flat tax because CPAs (probably some among us here ) need it to be more complicated than that... player agents need it to be more complicated than that, as well as the many legal minds that get to enjoy being on retainer for owners across the league.

 

[Rockport]

Yes.

Absolutely.

Reasons explained in this very thread, of course. (Mainly on the first page.)

I would only amend my previous thoughts by proposing that there could be a mechanism that pays out slightly more based on seniority... it is typical, after all, that pay scales will look at experience. Could be... doesn't have to be. Worth chewing on, anyway.

Won't happen. But should. Just as we will never have a flat tax because CPAs (probably some among us here ) need it to be more complicated than that... player agents need it to be more complicated than that, as well as the many legal minds that get to enjoy being on retainer for owners across the league.

No offense but that’s absolutely ridiculous. Players would never stand for a punter making the same as a 50-60 plays per game player.

 

[BaybeeJay]

At the risk of stating the obvious, the NFL climate as it has stood for all these years seriously dis-incentivizes teams from drafting well, and as much as Will McClay may be appreciated, he would be considered a friggin NFL Einstein probably if he didn't have to watch high performance players he scouted and more often than not personally made the case to draft skip town after all.

You know, we really don't have to do this over and over and over and over every year for player after player after player after player. It's a choice that the owners and the union have made. There are ways to eliminate all that agents get paid and all the hours sunk into negotiations, and just let the best players want to be the best players out of a genuine desire to be the best, to win games and to win titles... with the caveat, that you do have the incentive to get paid for the work you do in post season.

My proposal...

• Total of NFL salaries become tied directly to a specific established percentage share of regular season revenues plus established percentage share of post-season revenues. What negotiating there is to do is that, then. Only that.

• If you're on the roster for a regular season game, you all get paid the same, no matter your position, no matter your place on the depth chart and number of snaps you get. You're part of a team. Why is that a bad idea? It's not, not in this context of competitive professional sports.

• Same for post season. If you're on the roster, you get paid. If your team isn't in post season, that's income you're missing out on... so you'll want to do better next year, right? If your team is in post season, obviously you have incentive to keep winning.

• If you're on the practice squad, you get paid something very much like you already get now per game.

• The commitment that a team makes to its drafted players and its drafted players make to them is 4 years for Day One draftees (1st), 3 years for Day Two draftees (2nd/3rd), and 2 years for Day Three draftees (4th-7th). For all UDFA signees, there is a 1 year commitment.

• Following their initial commitment to each other, the player and the team alternate years in making decisions to continue their working relationship. For instance, a first rounder like CeeDee drafted 4 years ago right now would have made a decision in the off-season whether he wanted to continue playing in Dallas or transfer to another team. Assuming he re-upped with DAL, after this season DAL gets to make the decision whether to commit to him for 2025... and that dance continues through the rest of his career. So, effectively, the player in that situation gets the option every even year, and the team gets the option every odd year.

• Trades cannot be made unless the player is in his current team's year in which his team holds the option. Trades are made more simple by the fact that there is no salary consideration to deal with.

• If you're a star, great. But it's a team game like it was at the beginning of the sport now. Any extra income you're going to make is going to come from either playing post season or from endorsements or from post-career job opportunities that come to stars.

So what would a player make in 2024 under such a framework?

If my math is correct (per Spotrac, $275m 2024 average per team divided by 17 games divided by 53 players)... $305,000 per game in which they're on the roster... or about $5 million for the season.

Then, for post season participants, they currently are receiving either $41,500 (wild-card teams) or $46,500 (division winners) for wild-card games... $46,500 for the divisional round... and $69,000 for conference championships. Kansas City Chiefs players took home $157,000 as a result of winning the Super Bowl. San Francisco 49ers received $82,000.

Under this concept, though, the numbers would likely be seriously increased to correlate with post season income... and that's the part that is key if ever something like this became seriously considered. Owners would be opening up a whole other wing of their vault to players, ostensibly in exchange for the benefit of never having to negotiate another star QB contract (et al) again. Players would be mainly gaining from the new era because the players actually sacrificing would be the top tier earners... and if it came to a vote, of course, the top tier would be far out-numbered.

I'm a capitalist philosophically. Don't take this wrong. But I see reason for this specific economic environment for management and the union to come to agreement on a framework that cuts out the agents, and makes being a fan so much less about business, so much more purely about football and player performance.

So, now, feel free to let those rotten tomatoes fly... ...

I think smaller market teams would have greater difficulty retaining talents, as players flock to larger markets for better marketing oppurtunities. While that may be the case now, at least smaller market teams have the oppurtunity to pay more to keep players happy now.

 

[BaybeeJay]

No offense but that’s absolutely ridiculous. Players would never stand for a punter making the same as a 50-60 plays per game player.

Maybe standardize it to "snaps played" instead.

 

[_sturt_]

No offense but that’s absolutely ridiculous. Players would never stand for a punter making the same as a 50-60 plays per game player.

I never mind adjectives, so no offense taken.

I never mind predictions, so no offense taken on that part either.

My thing isn't any of that. My thing is objective discussion of the problem, and the solution proposed... pro or con. I believe the logic I've offered is stout. Maybe it could be improved upon in some way(s), but the basic concept makes sense... for, again, reasons already outlined, mainly on page 1 of the thread. Not real excited about repeating things I've already written, as I'm sure few of us are.

I will, though, repeat this one thing since it's a leading concern apparently: A significant majority of the players will make more money this way than the current way.

And just to answer this new thought... players, in my opinion, would never stand for a per-play wage... coaches certainly would especially lobby hard against such a thought... who wants to be having players even more constantly moaning about lack of playing time? Players would, in my opinion, buy-in to the idea that it's a team game, and if a team game, then an all-for-one-one-for-all attitude regarding game to game compensation is more coherent/consistent than what we have now.

 

[Rockport]

I never mind adjectives, so no offense taken.

I never mind predictions, so no offense taken on that part either.

My thing isn't any of that. My thing is objective discussion of the problem, and the solution proposed... pro or con. I believe the logic I've offered is stout. Maybe it could be improved upon in some way(s), but the basic concept makes sense... for, again, reasons already outlined, mainly on page 1 of the thread. Not real excited about repeating things I've already written, as I'm sure few of us are.

I will, though, repeat this one thing since it's a leading concern apparently: A significant majority of the players will make more money this way than the current way.

And just to answer this new thought... players, in my opinion, would never stand for a per-play wage... coaches certainly would especially lobby hard against such a thought... who wants to be having players even more constantly moaning about lack of playing time? Players would, in my opinion, buy-in to the idea that it's a team game, and if a team game, then an all-for-one-one-for-all attitude regarding game to game compensation is more coherent/consistent than what we have now.

Nothing about paying a punter the same as a QB makes sense.

 

[FuzzyLumpkins]

Yeah I’m not reading all that what did he say lol?

Basically presented an idea for Marxist pay scales and claimed to be a capitalist.

 

[DogFace]

Most union jobs I know of have a structured pay system where most make the same money. Some with more unique and sought after skills make slightly more.

 

[DogFace]

Basically presented an idea for Marxist pay scales and claimed to be a capitalist.

To be fair the owners all claim to be capitalists. Yet, they insist on a salary cap for their labor (they are the product too in this case) and often rely on tax payers to build “their” stadiums.

 

[_sturt_]

Nothing about paying a punter the same as a QB makes sense.

I'd argue the point, except I already did, and am allergic to repeating stuff as a rule. If your purpose was merely to voice disagreement... well taken. If your purpose was to argue the point, you'll have to quote me and use whatever substance you have on your side to debunk the rationale I'd offered. But even better still, if you argue with yourself a little about the rationale offered and decide maybe it makes sense after all in the bigger picture... I'll accept that as well .

 

[_sturt_]

Basically presented an idea for Marxist pay scales and claimed to be a capitalist.

Pardon me for saying so, but that's just a lazy assessment of what was presented. Surface. Shallow.

Yes, absolutely... you'll have a tough time finding a person more wedded to capitalist, free market economic philosophy as an overarching positive in elevating human well-being, and eroding poverty. That's just a fact. I've taught consumer economics to young adults as a matter of one of my professional hats. I've actually read Adam Smith... though the English of his day is quite a bear to trudge through, let me tell ya.

So, I don't say that flippantly.

But/and you'll also have a tough time finding a person more wedded to the value of productive conversation, and assessing situations for the variety of factors that can change the dynamics that normally suggest a conventional approach to be warranted... whether we're talking the economic domain or any other... legal... sociological... theological... etc etc etc. We can look no further than the medical domain and understand that the conventional approaches tend to be right, but that sometimes there are reasons to consider what is not conventional as a matter of diagnosis or of treatment.

Once we embrace this understanding, what is opaque becomes clearer:

Where the fundamental unit of production success is the individual person, then the person's capacity to individually create economic value needs to be rewarded... and/but... that it's not always the case that the fundamental unit of production success is the individual person... in this case, it is the group of individuals whose capacity to function well as a unit is the determinant of... what is in this specific economic domain... economic value... wins and losses.

And once we accept that as a principle... it is only rational, then, to begin to think about the situation in the terms presented in the OP.

 

[Rockport]

I'd argue the point, except I already did, and am allergic to repeating stuff as a rule. If your purpose was merely to voice disagreement... well taken. If your purpose was to argue the point, you'll have to quote me and use whatever substance you have on your side to debunk the rationale I'd offered. But even better still, if you argue with yourself a little about the rationale offered and decide maybe it makes sense after all in the bigger picture... I'll accept that as well .

WTH? And I’ve stated why it’s a dumb idea and would never fly.

 

[bandfan]

I can fix it really fast. Pay agents fees instead of percentages. See how fast they want to start signing players to contracts then...

 

[FuzzyLumpkins]

Pardon me for saying so, but that's just a lazy assessment of what was presented. Surface. Shallow.

Yes, absolutely... you'll have a tough time finding a person more wedded to capitalist, free market economic philosophy as an overarching positive in elevating human well-being, and eroding poverty. That's just a fact. I've taught consumer economics to young adults as a matter of one of my professional hats. I've actually read Adam Smith... though the English of his day is quite a bear to trudge through, let me tell ya.

So, I don't say that flippantly.

But/and you'll also have a tough time finding a person more wedded to the value of productive conversation, and assessing situations for the variety of factors that can change the dynamics that normally suggest a conventional approach to be warranted... whether we're talking the economic domain or any other... legal... sociological... theological... etc etc etc. We can look no further than the medical domain and understand that the conventional approaches tend to be right, but that sometimes there are reasons to consider what is not conventional as a matter of diagnosis or of treatment.

Once we embrace this understanding, what is opaque becomes clearer:

Where the fundamental unit of production success is the individual person, then the person's capacity to individually create economic value needs to be rewarded... and/but... that it's not always the case that the fundamental unit of production success is the individual person... in this case, it is the group of individuals whose capacity to function well as a unit is the determinant of... what is in this specific economic domain... economic value... wins and losses.

And once we accept that as a principle... it is only rational, then, to begin to think about the situation in the terms presented in the OP.

You were saying to pay all players equally. It was quite simple for all the words. Very similar to this post.

You start out saying that I am wrong, present an alternate view, and then nothing else. Whether or not to evaluate worth based on group versus individual dynamics is just more of the same dichotomy from Das Kapital aka Marxism.