It seems that the NFL and NFLPA are starting to make some headway on important issues pertaining to the CBA.
According to Jason Cole of Yahoo Sports, the owners and players have agreed to install a rookie wage scale to replace the current, ridiculous rookie salary cap. Thus, the days of a No. 1 pick like Sam Bradford receiving $13 million a year appear to be over (assuming of course that the two sides can agree on everything else CBA-related).
Cole provides more details:
According to two sources familiar with the negotiations, the league and the union have reached a basic compromise on a rookie wage scale that will replace the current rookie salary cap. The owners backed off the idea of requiring first-round picks to sign five-year deals, instead limiting the contracts to four years before a player could become a free agent. The agreement is also expected to include a stipulation limiting the amount of guaranteed money and signing bonus offered to draft picks.
In addition, the league agreed that all players drafted after the first round would be limited to three-year deals, but teams would be allowed to put restricted free agent tags after the three years. That’s essentially similar to the current process where players can be tagged as restricted free agents after a three-year deal, although the existing rule allows players drafted after the first round to sign four-year pacts.
The union wanted to reduce the number of years teams can sign rookies because they want the players to get to free agency faster. That certainly makes sense, but something had to be done about the old rookie pay scale because players were making too much money. Teams had to invest a lot of dough in players that had never seen a down in the NFL, which made zero sense. On top of that, you had teams trying to trade out of the top 5 because they didn’t want to pay a player millions of dollars and have him turn out to be a bust. Yet, many times they couldn’t because other teams didn’t want to take on similar risks.
This is great news for two reasons. One, the old rookie pay structure was a joke and had to be changed. Two, it finally looks like the two sides are making some serious headway when it comes to the CBA.
