NFL taking away Redskins cap space

[mooby]

Originally Posted by skinsfaninok

OK been out for a few( new baby boy) so what's the latest on this cap crap?

Congrats!

[JoeRedskin]

Originally Posted by SBXVII

But your talking about a league that looked at a trade scenario and said no you can't do it. They didn't approve it and later cry foul.

The NFL had every opportunity to contact both teams and say "you can't do that" or reject the contracts/deals that were made. But they didn't. They approved them and now later the other teams are crying fould cause they don't have as much money to spend and now they want the NFL to penalize both teams in order to make them competative with the Skins and Cowboys. You can't do that.

By the way, the CBA had expired. What they had basically was a gentlemans agreement if you'd call it that and the league approved the deals.

The uncapped year was contained in the prior CBA - essentially it was an agreement between the parties that, if the CBA was not renewed, the year after non-renewal would be uncapped. So, while the terms of the prior CBA expired, the owners and players agreement (in this case the agreement to blow up the salary cap) continued one year past that expiration of those terms.

[FRPLG]

I think Tripp is right. The more I have thought about it the more the litigation route seems useless other than perhaps some type of temporary injunction.

The problem is this. The league can do whatever it wants internally to the degree that it doesn't impair the unionized players to lose money. Speaking legally. If they want to enact wonky salary cap rules that distributes cap space proportional to record they can do that as long as it doesn't hurt the players' earning power. That type of major move would certainly get the NFLPA up in arms and a protracted legal battle might ensue but the players wouldn't definitely win..they only might win. Additionally if they want to enact in-game rules to favor certain teams they can do that too. None of it has to be "fair" but it's their league..they make the rules (or, more accurately, make up the rules as they go). What the league has done is patently unfair in philosophical sense but not really so in any type of legally enforceable sense.

On one hand the league just came out a labor dispute in which they essentially argued that the NFL is one big company and not 32 individual teams working together in a collusive manner. Speaking from a business standpoint this makes total sense. On the other hand when it comes to on-field competitiveness the teams clearly are not one unit but separate in every way. Competing for cap-space is a direct on-field issue while competing for real business dollars is a business issue.

The salary cap bridges the two worlds. Business and on-field competitiveness

[WilbursHomie]

I've always said the off season is the regular season for a Skins fan. So much media coverage and FA isn't even here yet. Touché Dan Snyder. Looking forward to the next few months until kick off and ESPN forgets we exist again. FML.

[biffle]

Originally Posted by mooby

No I haven't been following the news, what's going on?

Just because the NFL attempted to punish the Redskins for breaking an unwritten rule doesn't mean the punishment will stand up in court.

No it doesn't. And hopefully it won't.

But I was just making a joke because someone seemed to mock the idea of doing something about teams that were below the salary floor in 2010 because 'you can't just go back and apply rules retroactively' or whatever. Sorry the attempt at levity was apparently not up to your standards.

[Lotus]

Originally Posted by biffle

Problem with that analogy is that the Tuck Rule was, you know, the rule. What we did was also the rule and they're trying to retroactively punish us for following the rules. Again, the analogy would be punishing the Pats for benifitting from the rule that was in place at the time.

If this goes to court, the NFL would have to get on the stand and admit that they are punishing us for not going along with collusion. I don't know how they think they can get away with that.

I also don't know how they think they can punish us the full amount of the Haynesworth and Hall bonuses, but the Bears are in fact rewarded with extra cap space in spite of the way they did the Peppers contract.

This whole thing is outright lunacy.

That's one reason why this will likely never go to court. Another is that owners (excepting Al Davis, once) don't bite the hand that feeds them by suing the NFL.

There are owners meetings at the end of March. Danny and Jerry will moan and perhaps threaten a lawsuit. People will get upset. But then calmer heads will prevail and the penalties will be reduced. At least, IMO, that's how this will shake out.

[mbedner3420]

Originally Posted by Lotus

That's one reason why this will likely never go to court. Another is that owners (excepting Al Davis, once) don't bite the hand that feeds them by suing the NFL.

There are owners meetings at the end of March. Danny and Jerry will moan and perhaps threaten a lawsuit. People will get upset. But then calmer heads will prevail and the penalties will be reduced. At least, IMO, that's how this will shake out.

That's entirely useless to use given that free agency starts tomorrow...

[FRPLG]

I say we go about FA exactly to plan prior to this debacle...file a motion for temp injunction...gather as many troops as possible... and go to the owners meetings and start dropping bombs. The two most valuable (money-wise) teams plus I am sure a few others that have to be a little miffed about this can probably get this straightened back out.

I think a fair solution is this. Any team that dumped any money into 2010 gets punished uniformly. That money goes to the teams that didn't. If there are too many that did the dumping then forget it and move on. Oh and make some adjustments for what players would have earned anyways in 2010 and allow the docked cap space to be spread over a more reasonable 5 years. Any owners who want to bitch and moan...Jerry and Dan can tell 'em to eff themselves, they can buy their team and fold it (that last part was a little poetic license and completely unreasonable I know)

[biffle]

Originally Posted by mbedner3420

That's entirely useless to use given that free agency starts tomorrow...

I was gonna say that.

And I think they're really testing the "owners don't sue the league" line by selectively punishing teams that followed a rule and effectively kneecapping Snyder's chances to build a team right when he finally had his coach, QB, other pieces and big cap room aligned. I don't see him taking that lying down, and will be mad if he does.

[mooby]

Originally Posted by mbedner3420

That's entirely useless to use given that free agency starts tomorrow...

Not really. We have the option of pushing the entire penalty back to 2013, or paying it however we see fit. If we don't pay any of it now and continue forward as planned, and jerr-Dan raise hell at the owners meetings and get the penalty reduced, we'll probably incur some form of penalty but hopefully nowhere near as significant as this one.

[Lotus]

Originally Posted by mbedner3420

That's entirely useless to use given that free agency starts tomorrow...

No it is not useless. We can act in free agency as if there will be little to no penalty on the premise that things will change. Besides, we have two years to meet the penalty in the worst case.

If I'm Bruce Allen I'm approaching FA as if nothing has changed.

[FRPLG]

The fact that FA starts tomorrow is irrelevant, we're not going to sign enough guys tomorrow to make the lowered cap meaningful. And I suspect the plan right now is to say eff it and go about FA as always planned. Based on Allen's statement that is.

[Lotus]

Originally Posted by mooby

Not really. We have the option of pushing the entire penalty back to 2013, or paying it however we see fit. If we don't pay any of it now and continue forward as planned, and jerr-Dan raise hell at the owners meetings and get the penalty reduced, we'll probably incur some form of penalty but hopefully nowhere near as significant as this one.

Yet again great minds think alike.

[mooby]

Originally Posted by biffle

No it doesn't. And hopefully it won't.

But I was just making a joke because someone seemed to mock the idea of doing something about teams that were below the salary floor in 2010 because 'you can't just go back and apply rules retroactively' or whatever. Sorry the attempt at levity was apparently not up to your standards.

Ah I must've missed it. It's all good bro.

[skinsfaninok]

I expect the skins to still go heavy for Jackson and possibly garcon too