Over the last few weeks I have been seeing some real good players get cut for Salary Cap reasons and I have to see that this Salary Cap is way to low. This league is losing good players because of it and I hope that it goes up significantly next year.
What some people don't realise is that the cap is in place to level the playing field.
First of all I doubt that any team could afford an 8 million dollar payroll but if there were some that could they would simply buy all the best players and win the cup every-time. The fans of the smaller teams would give up, stop going to the games and those teams would simply fold.
What would you rather have.
2 teams or 8
I also wonder how many teams would be cutting big salaries today if they had respected the soft cap yesterday?
The cap will almost certainly rise next year, or the year after when the new TV deal kicks in.
Plus overall league revenues continue to rise and so the cap will as well.
Some people seem to think there have been a lot of vets released because of the cap.
I personally am surprised at how few have been.
Given that in a normal year, the number of free agents would have been 2 to 3 times as many as it was this year because most teams took advantage of the "signing bonus" loophole, releasing a handful of vets is just par for the course.
For example, the Riders released Nate Davis and Andrew Greene. That was about as much a surprise as a sunny day on the Prairies.
Cap or no cap, Tillman was going to release some vets. The fact that he never even attempted to renegotiate those contracts tells the real story.
Anyway, the true test of the cap won't be this year, but next, when the signing bonus loophole is no longer available.
Also, it will be interesting to see how teams deal with players who received a big signing bonus, but get hurt, or need to be cut. The best example I can think of here, is Mookie Mitchell.
Tillman says he will play for 52 grand this year. The guy is getting long in the tooth, and has been hurt a lot in recent years.
If he can no longer get the job done, can the 'Smoes afford to release him?
And everyteam will have a few players in that boat this year....
The Salary cap, or SMS(pick your poison), I believe should have a "floor" or minimum that you have to spend on salaries. I believe that 2.5 million would fit the bill for the CFL.
there is a minimum set by the CFLPA - theres a certain % of team income that must be spent on palyers salaries... or something like that. as well, there is a minimum player salary
Most (all?) other leagues with a cap have a minimum, as well as a maximum.
I don’t know that it is much of an issue in the CFL though, as every team in the league has likely had to cut salary just to get under the cap.
I don't agree.
Placing a max on salaries will enforce parity because it will keep richer teams from building too strong a team and disadvantage.
If a team is to dumb to pay players a minimum.....then its their problem
In other words....you cannot legislate against stupidity!
However it also depends on how you look at a minimum.
Paying 10 players a minimum of 30K each does result in a 300,000$ per team minimum and I have no problem with that...... Having a 400,000$ team minimum is another story.
re-Placing a max on salaries will enforce parity because it will keep richer teams from building too strong a team and disadvantage.------ salaries wont dictate parity, just push teams to the brink, financialy, But the players should be rewarded if they have proven themselves, ie bonus heavy contracts based on performance.
It’s a safeguard against a dumb owner who wants to throw the season and save money. It is also a small victory for the CFLPA, making sure the players are paid what they are suppose to get.
Bottom line is, the risk of having a salary cap too low, is that the average salary of CFL players will go down. If every team in the CFL has spent over the cap to date, it doesn't take a mathemetician to realize that if every team is having to reduce its total salary, while keeping the same number of players on its roster, the average salary has to go down.
There may not be alot of other options for potential CFL players, but there are other options. Will a lower salary be a deterrent to an American player wanting to come up to Canada to play? Will the CFL lose out on attracing some talented players to this league? Maybe. Only time will tell. But there isn't a salary cap in any pro league that is set so low that every team spends right to the cap. I don't hear of any CFL team claiming to have room under the $4.05MM cap. In fact, it seems like every CFL team is struggling to get under it, so pretty much every team will be spending right at the cap. Is this the best thing? I think the cap should be somewhat higher, but I'm sure it will be adjusted in future years.