Sturm On Cowboys Contract Handling

[waldoputty]

Now, there is one thing that I continue to be dissatisfied about, and that is the way they write their contracts. They do not write contracts that they intend to honor as written. They write contracts to allow them multiple restructures to accommodate other contracts that they have already restructured to make room for contracts that they wrote before that were restructured. And so on and so on and so on. There was some back and forth on this behavior this past week when Stephen Jones again defended the fine art of credit-card juggling.

They have so much dead money on Player A, that they must restructure Player B to free up the room. But, then, Player B cannot be cut because he isn't very good anymore, since the restructure guaranteed money for him in Year 3 of his deal (because of Player A's situation), so now we must restructure Player C's deal to accommodate Player B, who is only in his spot because of Player A. It is maddening. But, perhaps not as maddening as knowing we have all be desensitized to it as a poor way of doing business.

There are media folks who tell us "everyone does it", which is sort of true, but not. Yes, everyone you know uses credit cards. So, you can justify your credit card use by looking around the room and seeing everyone uses them. But, does everyone open up new credit cards to pay off the old ones? Does everyone max them out and have to sit out shopping because of the unpaid balances?

The Cowboys are doing better, but a sign that they are still in a weird spot is that they definitely need to retain some players, but in order to do so, they have to figure out how to restructure more deals to make even a little room.

http://sportsday.***BANNED-URL***/d.../2017/03/06/cowboys-money-problem-free-agency

if you deleverage your salary cap all at once, you are essentially squeezing money out of the team.
that is fine if the team is horrible, then tank and get better draft picks.
deleveraging can happen in 1 or 2 years.

it is stupid to deleverage when you just went 13-3.
and when dez has 2-3 years of high performance left.
and you are in the heart of zeke's prime.

with the salary cap rise in the next 3-4 years and romo's salary being gone, there are easy and painless ways to deal with the cap.

 

[Wolfpack]

Great article.

 

[NorthTexan95]

I'm sorry but how does restructuring contracts hurt them? As long as they have money to re-sign their guys I don't see the problem.

Yeah, Sturm doesn't really present any real evidence of an issue. The salary cap is merely an accounting function and can be manipulated in many ways.

 

[CATCH17]

Yep, pressure. Charles Haley and the 92' Cowboys.

Signing Charles Haley wouldn't help this defense win a championship.

Defense isn't going to win a championship regardless. It's not a defensive league anymore. The rules make it hard to defend.

Signing Charles Haley may get us the 1 or 2 extra stops or extra possessions we need.



Dallas has the right idea... Control the football, score points, and keep your opponents point totals low.

We just need to keep improving defensively but defense will not win us a championship unless we commit to it in free agency and start letting some of our offensive pieces walk.

 

[DCBoysfan]

I have no problem with anything he wrote. I'm not a fan of the constant restructures either.

 

[Plankton]

I'm sorry but how does restructuring contracts hurt them? As long as they have money to re-sign their guys I don't see the problem.

Ask yourself how the Cowboys in the 2001 season were completely busted against the salary cap, and you will have your answer.

If you have a number of players that you have extended in this manner all of a sudden get injured, and can't play for you anymore, the bill comes due.

 

[DrunkWithPower]

From Sturm, "Try writing one deal that you plan to pay out as you wish. Write one deal where in Year 3 of a five-year deal, if you don't like the player's performance, you can walk away because you paid him every guaranteed penny when it was scheduled."

Do they acutally write the contracts with language regarding possible future restructures, or can any contract be restructured simply by adding an addendum to convert salary to signing bonus and getting a player signature? I just thought they could do it with any contract.

 

[waldoputty]

From Sturm, "Try writing one deal that you plan to pay out as you wish. Write one deal where in Year 3 of a five-year deal, if you don't like the player's performance, you can walk away because you paid him every guaranteed penny when it was scheduled."

Do they acutally write the contracts with language regarding possible future restructures, or can any contract be restructured simply by adding an addendum to convert salary to signing bonus and getting a player signature? I just thought they could do it with any contract.

many contracts are designed so restructuring works well.
they typically have year 1 salary ~minimum but with a signing bonus that makes the player happy.
that boosts the salary of the follow-on years.
if needed, the salary of the follow-on year can be reduced to minimum and pay out a restructuring bonus.
that cuts the later year salary substantially but it will be higher than the year 1 salary.
it is very simple and standard.
if the original signing bonus is not enough to make the player happy, increase the guaranteed dollars of the contract.

 

[waldoputty]

Ask yourself how the Cowboys in the 2001 season were completely busted against the salary cap, and you will have your answer.

If you have a number of players that you have extended in this manner all of a sudden get injured, and can't play for you anymore, the bill comes due.

that is true but much less true since 2015 when the cap regularly goes up by $10M so or per year.
that is even less true when romo's salary comes free.
cowboys will have ~50m cap space in 2018.

because of the rapid cap escalation since 2014, teams have recovered from cap messes and are now flushed with cash.
currently, 2/3 of the teams in the league could go out and sign 3-4 war daddies and make their cap work easily in the next 4-5 years.
if anything, the players can make a case for collusion keeping salaries lower.

 

[Toruk_Makto]

In a rising cap environment if you're not restructuring base salaries on an as needed basis to butt up against the salary cap ceiling you're playing at a disadvantage.

For instance the Crawford contract. nobody signed his 5 year deal thinking we'd want to move on after year 2. NFL contracts are largely designed to be 3 year pacts. It is why agents care so much about how much will be paid out during the first 3 years.

Why in the world would we want to cut Crawford who has position flex and was one of the league leaders in all the National Football League in hurries. And while what Sturm said is correct and you want to be thoughtful on who you restructure....that is exactly what the Cowboys do. It's why i've had to fight with people on this board who say we should restructure everyone always.

What we do is smart. What we haven't always done is have a smart team-building mantra to pair with an appropriately aggressive cap manager. Now we do and the results are concomitant.

 

[Plankton]

that is true but much less true since 2015 when the cap regularly goes up by $10M so or per year.
that is even less true when romo's salary comes free.
cowboys will have ~50m cap space in 2018.

because of the rapid cap escalation since 2014, teams have recovered from cap messes and are now flushed with cash.
currently, 2/3 of the teams in the league could go out and sign 3-4 war daddies and make their cap work easily in the next 4-5 years.
if anything, the players can make a case for collusion keeping salaries lower.

The worm is going to turn on that one within the next five years.

 

[waldoputty]

The worm is going to turn on that one within the next five years.

if you mean the cap will stop rising, that can readily happen.
but you can adjust based on what the tv contract will shape like.
in the meantime, letting we are wasting dez/zeke primes by going in half-pregnant.

 

[Alexander]

Yeah, Sturm doesn't really present any real evidence of an issue. The salary cap is merely an accounting function and can be manipulated in many ways.

I think the fact we are at the bottom of available space practically every year and have to borrow against contracts to get cap complaint speaks to evidence of an issue.

It is a credit card mentality. They are so used to it, they think it is a sound business practice.

 

[yimyammer]

The thing I don't like about restructuring is that it pushes money up front and pays guys early.

That kills the motivation for some players.

Virtually every contract has big upfront guarantees/signing bonuses, so your scenario isn't avoidable except on rookie deals or players who's perceived talent doesn't earn them these types of contracts. Therefore (IMHO) its better to eat these guarantees in the first 2 years of the contract so the team has leverage over the player should he decide to slack off. I hate being stuck with a player because the team has backed themselves into a corner with the contract and subsequent restructures.

IMO, the team, needs a year when they can eat virtually all the dead money and create a huge pile of cap room so they can work to pay most players on pay as you go deals where the team is only "stuck" with the player for the first two years of the deal and then don't bloat years 3+ so they can have leverage and options (to trade or cut).

 

[TheMarathonContinues]

Yeah, Sturm doesn't really present any real evidence of an issue. The salary cap is merely an accounting function and can be manipulated in many ways.

Right. And you can sit here and say we haven't won a ring in 20 years but what is the proof that is because of our salary cap?

Cowboys are in their current situation because they have drafted well enough to have a few max guys on their roster. Teams like the Jaguars and Browns don't therefore can wast money every free agency on guys who don't deserve it.

 

[waldoputty]

Right. And you can sit here and say we haven't won a ring in 20 years but what is the proof that is because of our salary cap?

Cowboys are in their current situation because they have drafted well enough to have a few max guys on their roster. Teams like the Jaguars and Browns don't therefore can wast money every free agency on guys who don't deserve it.

if not for the salary cap, we could have done the Giants D rebuild last year and won the superbowl.

 

[TheMarathonContinues]

if not for the salary cap, we could have done the Giants D rebuild last year and won the superbowl.

You can't spend 200 million on that defense and then have a offensive line like ours.

Have you seen the Giants offensive line? Or their running backs?

You can't have it all. You can't say oh well we want Romo, Dez, Fredericks, Tyron Smith and then say lets go out and spend 200 million on defense.


And btw, a big part of that D getting better was Landon Collins. Their draft pick. Because the Giants sucked at the draft they didn't have to re-sign any of their rookies to big contracts and instead how to overpay for overrated free agents.

 

[waldoputty]

You can't spend 200 million on that defense and then have a offensive line like ours.

Have you seen the Giants offensive line? Or their running backs?

You can't have it all. You can't say oh well we want Romo, Dez, Fredericks, Tyron Smith and then say lets go out and spend 200 million on defense.

And btw, a big part of that D getting better was Landon Collins. Their draft pick. Because the Giants sucked at the draft they didn't have to re-sign any of their rookies to big contracts and instead how to overpay for overrated free agents.

well someone said if there is no salary cap?
and actually we could have signed 200 million in FAs this year because their 2017 cap impact is 18 million or so.
and the cap space rapidly expands after 2017.

that is why so many teams have so much cap space and doing nothing with it.
there is too much $.

 

[TheMarathonContinues]

well someone said if there is no salary cap?
and actually we could have signed 200 million in FAs this year because their 2017 cap impact is 18 million or so.
and the cap space rapidly expands after 2017.

that is why so many teams have so much cap space and doing nothing with it.
there is too much $.

Probably because there is no one to spend it on. This has been one of the worst free agent classes I can remember.

 

[bayeslife]

Sturm is an armchair cap analyst. Half of what he said is either misguided or factually incorrect