I heard on ESPN Radio that actually the Eagles do hold almost all the cards - reason being is that T.O. did not get a signing bonus, he got a reporting bonus. And reporting bonuses aren’t spread out along the length of the contract, so that there is zero cost to the cap now. It all came out of last year’s cap.
The only thing they owe him is the salary. Yes, he is due another reporting bonus next year if they do keep him (which has zero chance of happening now).
The Eagles’ are totally protected when it comes to the cap.
Guy said that it was an incredibly smart contract from the Eagles’ perspective, and that it’s the only one he knows of structured like that.
Good stuff, that explains a lot. I guess now I see what they mean when they say they signed a bad contract last year. The signing bonus does more than guarantee money; it acts as a mechanism to ensure job security in the first couple/few years of a long contract, as per the above posts. (Virtually all contracts are viewed by teams and players as three year deals, regardless how many extra years are in it on paper.)
Well, if T.O. and his agent hadn’t waited until the last possible second to file for free agency, maybe he wouldn’t have had that whole Baltimore fiasco to deal with in the first place, and thus would have been able to sign a normal contract.
I still have zero sympathy. (Checks fandom.) No, wait, I mean, Go T.O.! Fight the Power! Stick It To The Man!
Hell yeah I was enjoying it. It was football! 4 weeks of appetizers before the main feast. Plus you get a chance to get the first look at some of the draft picks and, if paying close attention, can watch how well they show improvement.
footballfootballfootballfootballfootball
I’d just like to point out that I think any good economist or attorney would say the whole theory that players should be able to hold out because teams can cut them is ridiculous. I hear this over and over, and it does not make sense to me.
When signing the contract, players are aware that the contract contains express provisions allowing the team to cut them after a year. It is permitted in the contract. The player, on the other hand, is not permitted under the contract to hold out.
For those who say it is unfair, it is not. Fundamental to the theory of contract law is that both parties give some form of consideration. However, the consideration does not have to be the same (in other words, just because one side can get out in 30 days does not mean the other side must be able to get out in 30 days).
Likewise, I think that economically, it is pretty easy for a team to say, “Yes, he can be cut after one year. The consideration he receives for that is a higher amount up front, and a higher total price (which means a higher first year salary) than we would otherwise pay him.”
For the people who believe NFL contracts are “unfair,” what is your response to the Eagles saying, “We agreed, under the contract, to pay T.O. the price of $7 million a year in part because we wanted the right to terminate him after a year if he did not perform. That right was worth a lot of money to us, and there is no way we would have paid him $7 million last year if we did not have that contractual right.”
It pains me to hear someone say that it’s “unfair” that they can be cut at any given time. Is it possible that they are being paid millions of dollars per year, in part, because of that right?
He’s permitted to hold out by the collective bargaining agreement that governs all NFL contracts. The CBA lays out nominal (but ultimately inconsequential) penalties for situations in which a player would typically hold out. The player can hold out and suffer those specific consequences, which are agreed upon in advance.
When a player and a team sign a contract, there’s an expectation of a certain level of play. If the player doesn’t play up to that expectation, the team can cut him. If the player exceeds that expectation, what happens? Say a running back drafted in the sixth round signs a four year contract for a $25,000 signing bonus and base salaries of $250,000, $350,000, $500,000, and $750,000. For those salaries, the team probably expects 200 yards rushing, 100 receiving, and a body to try to pick up the blitz, but he goes out his rookie year and rushes for 1,100 yards. His second year, he rushes for 1,500 yards. At this point, the team is getting far more than they ever expected out of that contract. Why shouldn’t the player be able to renegotiate the contract?
It also protects the teams from each other. If contract holdouts weren’t allowed, every GM in the game would be praying that they’d draft Terrell Davis in the sixth round. Far more likely, though, would be one of the other 31 teams unearthing that hidden gem. With the way the salary cap works, whichever team makes that lucky strike would have an enormous competitive advantage over everyone else.
Most player holdouts are resolved with a minimum of antagonism, because they most often occur when a player has performed at a level far above his salary. The team recognizes this and freely acknowledges that he should be paid more. The holdout only emphasizes the importance of getting a new contract done. T.O.'s situation is vastly different from the typical holdout, because the team doesn’t feel that his performance merits a new contract.
For every NFL contract you sign? It’s gotta be easier to deal with an occasional holdout (there are usually only a few each year) than it would be to negotiate incentives clauses for someone who probably won’t ever make it farther than the practice squad.
Well, the NFL is not fantasy football and there is a lot more to value than the stats someone puts up. To continue on with Enginerd’s example what if that running back ran for 400 yards, 500 yards, 600 700… 2000? What if he ran for 500 and had 200 recieving yards, 300 400 500 etc. etc. What if he scored 8 TDs, 9, 10, 15? Not only do you have to account for each and every one of these scenarios you have to accurately predict the market in 2-3 years. Even if you had a 300 page contract for each and every scenario it still might not accurately reflect the market a couple years down the road.
Yes, they can cut him; that’s their only contractual option. They cannot force an underperforming player to take a pay cut. Thus teams can (and do, routinely) overpay players who are not as good as predicted.
Of course, there’s an easy solution: If a player is concerned about being underpaid, he can simply never sign anything but one-year contracts. Each year, he’d get market value for his skills.
They don’t do that, because both sides desire to have continuity. Both sides pay for that stability: the player’s actual value may end up higher or lower than expected. Furthermore, both sides may terminate the agreement at any time: the team may cut the player, and the player may retire.
Nobody has a right to any given profession, including professional athletes.
They can offer him the choice between a pay cut and an outright release. It happens every year, and every year there are a few guys who think their market value is higher than it is, so they refuse the pay cut and are released. Often they end up signing again with the original team for a lower salary.
Not at all. After Ricky Williams “retirement,” a court ruled that he was liable for more than $8 million of the signing bonus from his Dolphins contract. A player with a relatively new contract who’s not at a typical retirement age can’t use it as an out. Retirement also doesn’t allow the player to get market value for his skills; if he returns, he’s immediately considered under contract with his last team.
furt, I’m not really sure what you’re arguing. Are you saying that players should always honor their contracts and never hold out?
I think, respectfully, that you are missing my point. Legally, ethically, and economically, there is no problem with this system so long as it is known up front. How do you know I didn’t pay you $7 million for that first year for the right to cut you if you underperform and keep you if you overperform, where I may have only paid you $5 million if I had to keep you for a full 3 years no matter what?
That’s the point; you know the deal up front. You know that you can be cut, but do not have the right to increase your pay if you do really well. That’s why you bargain for a greater dollar amount total (including in signing bonuses, which are non-returnable) than you would if the team did not have that right.
So what players are doing, basically, is saying, “Hey, I knew what the contract said. I got money, part of which was paid so that the team could have that contractual right to get rid of me if I underperform and keep me if I overperform. Now that I have taken that money in the first year, I don’t feel like performing in accordance with the contractual right I was paid to perform.”
I can guarantee you that under both a legal and economic analysis, it’s not as simple as, “Why can you cut me for bad performance, and I can’t hold out for good performance?” Because the contract isn’t drafted that way, it doesn’t have to be, and you were paid good money to have an unbalanced contract in the team’s favor.
The individual contract isn’t drafted that way, but the collective bargaining agreement between the Players’ Association and the league is. The CBA, which governs all contracts between players and teams, stipulates exactly what can and can’t happen when a player holds out, including maximum penalties that a team may enforce against the player. The team knows the deal up front - they know that a player may feel he’s outperformed his current contract and hold out, and they know what recourse they have during that situation. The player knows that he has the right to hold out if he accepts those specific consequences and he understands that the team is in no way obligated to sign a new contract. At least, he should…
The situation is governed by two contracts rather than one, and everybody’s aware of the possibilities ahead of time.