Scourton isn't signed (& apparently it's a thing)

[NAS]

6 minutes ago, TD alt said:

Not fully understanding. I don't get why there has to be no cap for my point to be valid. In a perfect world, they can have a cap and have guaranteed rookie contracts. The two aren't mutually exclusive. It's just a matter of finding the sweet spot that makes most satisfied. 

If the contract is fully guaranteed and a player goes bust, it puts the teams at a huge disadvantage from a cap perspective and impacts their ability to pay veteran players who have actually proven themselves.  

Edited 2 hours ago by NAS

[TD alt]

5 minutes ago, NAS said:

If the contract is fully guaranteed and a player goes bust, it puts the teams at a huge disadvantage from a cap perspective and impacts their ability to pay veteran players who have actually proven themselves.  

That's basically what I said...

If the guarantees are smaller, and/or the system is designed in such a way that balances the difference between rookies and vets, then the hit on the cap is mitigated. Yes, I realize that's what they were trying to do with the rookie wage scale, but obviously too many loopholes have evolved. It's time to modify the agreement (which probably won't happen), or we're just going to be in this position for the next half dozen years.

I guess that I take a harder line. In my world, once you get drafted, you get drafted and play by the current rules. If you don't want to play by the rules then you'd just sit out until you do. You couldn't escape the situation by sitting out another year, you'd just have to play by the rules as they are, and not how you think that they should be. If gray areas arise, then the NFL and NFLPA would have to come to overarching solutions.

[NAS]

10 minutes ago, TD alt said:

That's basically what I said...

If the guarantees are smaller, and/or the system is designed in such a way that balances the difference between rookies and vets, then the hit on the cap is mitigated. Yes, I realize that's what they were trying to do with the rookie wage scale, but obviously too many loopholes have evolved. It's time to modify the agreement (which probably won't happen), or we're just going to be in this position for the next half dozen years.

I guess that I take a harder line. In my world, once you get drafted, you get drafted and play by the current rules. If you don't want to play by the rules then you'd just sit out until you do. You couldn't escape the situation by sitting out another year, you'd just have to play by the rules as they are, and not how you think that they should be. If gray areas arise, then the NFL and NFLPA would have to come to overarching solutions.

Agreed,  thanks for clarifying 

[PNW_PantherMan]

10 minutes ago, TD alt said:

That's basically what I said...

If the guarantees are smaller, and/or the system is designed in such a way that balances the difference between rookies and vets, then the hit on the cap is mitigated. Yes, I realize that's what they were trying to do with the rookie wage scale, but obviously too many loopholes have evolved. It's time to modify the agreement (which probably won't happen), or we're just going to be in this position for the next half dozen years.

I guess that I take a harder line. In my world, once you get drafted, you get drafted and play by the current rules. If you don't want to play by the rules then you'd just sit out until you do. You couldn't escape the situation by sitting out another year, you'd just have to play by the rules as they are, and not how you think that they should be. If gray areas arise, then the NFL and NFLPA would have to come to overarching solutions.

They should just be predetermined slotted contracts.  I feel like that was the intention of the current system, but they left too much room for interpretation about guaranteed money.  I agree though.  You play for who drafts you or you don't play.

[tukafan21]

14 hours ago, TD alt said:

Maybe I'm just not understanding, but everywhere that I have read says that signing bonuses go against the cap prorated by as much as five years. The following example uses Andrew Luck's rookie contract as an example.

"Take Andrew Luck, the first overall pick in the 2012 NFL draft. Luck signed a four-year contract with the Colts worth $22.1 million and included a $14.5 million signing bonus. Rather than a $14.5 million cap hit in 2012, the Colts spread out his signing bonus over the life of his contract. The hit against the cap would be $3.625 million per year over four years instead of a direct cap hit of $14.5 million directly in 2012. This gave the Colts more leverage and cap flexibility in signing other players."

https://www.the33rdteam.com/nfl-signing-bonuses-explained/

I don't know why some of you think that signing bonuses aren't counted against the cap over the length of the contract, but whatever.

 

"The bonus with a signing is usually the most garish aspect of a rookie contract. Bonus is the immediate cash players receive when they ink a deal. It factors into the cap, but only for the whole contract duration, in terms of salary cap calculations. In the case of Bryce Young’s $24.6 million signing bonus, that’s prorated to approximately $6.15 million per season over a four-year deal.

This format allows teams to handle the cap and provides rookies with some short-term fiscal stability, which is important given the high injury risk in this league."

https://collegefootballnetwork.com/how-rookie-contracts-work-in-the-nfl/

I understand how signing bonuses can be a useful tool in order to manage the cap, and as one of the article suggests, signing bonuses may become important if you have a tight cap, but the bill is always going to come due. I'm not necessarily referring to you Tuka, but it seems to me that others simply don't want to understand that fact which is why they're reacting to what I'm saying negatively. How odd. In any event, I have a better general understanding of why signing bonuses are used now, and it's generally to fit salaries under the cap. Surely players, whether they be rookies or not, love a signing bonus because they get a good portion of their money up front. This in turn gives them more security and probably amounts to tax benefits as well. I also understand why teams would not want to use signing bonuses, particularly for players or draftees who have a higher probability of being gone before a contract even ends.

Nobody is saying they don't count against the cap, because yes, they technically do count against the cap as it's money the team is paying and it needs to be accounted for.

But what you're not grasping it seems is that if a player gets $10 million guaranteed in their contract, whether they get literally $0 as a signing bonus or $8 million as a signing bonus, it doesn't change the overall cap hit of the contract, because cap hits are about the guaranteed money, not how much is paid up front.

The only thing that how much is paid up front changes, is how the cap hit can be spread out amongst the years.

So yes, technically there could end up being a slightly bigger cap hit in year 3 and 4 due to a bigger signing bonus, but if that is the case, it also means there will be a lesser cap hit in years 1 and 2 than there would have been with a smaller bonus.  But over the length of the contract, the size of the signing bonus has literally zero affect on the overall cap hit of the contract, because THAT part of it is 100% about the guaranteed money and nothing else.