The idea of the NRL salary cap is to have a level playing field and making all teams equal.
The NRL website states the following about the salary cap:
“The NRL Salary Cap serves two functions:
1) It assists in “spreading the playing talent” so that a few better resourced clubs cannot simply out-bid other clubs for all of the best players. If a few clubs are able to spend unlimited funds it will reduce the attraction of games to fans, sponsors and media partners due to an uneven competition.
Allowing clubs to spend an unlimited amount on players would drive some clubs out of the competition as they would struggle to match the prices wealthy clubs could afford to pay.
2) It ensures clubs are not put into a position where they are forced to spend more money than they can afford, in terms of player payments, just to be competitive.”
But the reality of the salary cap is that it has created a cycle where teams build up over a number of years to the point where they are at or near the top and then find they can’t keep all of the good roster that they have built up and so then begin to lose payers which starts them on a downward trend.
This is because, that as young players mature and improve they become desirable to have by rival teams which then pushes up their market value.
The club that developed the player then must increase their pay or lose them.
To then stay under the cap, they have to let other players go.
Sometimes it is long term good players that are let go despite being loyal club men as they are at the end of their career, or sometimes the clubs choose to keep the experienced player and let the young player go – which of course is a short term gain for a long term loss.
Either way, the clubs must make hard choices.
Either way, they will suffer a fall in their quality as they have either lost the young up and comers or they lose their experienced players.
And the main reason I dislike the cap is that it can be rorted.
The Storm and ‘Dogs both came undone in a big way by trying to cheat the cap.
The big question is – how many clubs are breaking it now and getting away with it?
There is always a lot of talk about refining the salary cap to make it work better.
In my opinion if we are to change the cap we need to look for a system that genuinely puts all clubs on an equal footing and allows them to keep their own junior players. As well as making it cheat proof.
We also owe it to both the clubs and the fans to find a system that ensures clubs can retain juniors and or long term players.
Some suggestions are laid out below
• That junior players should not count in the cap. This would encourage clubs to develop their junior players and allow them to keep them.
• That long term imported players are either not counted in the cap or are discounted. This will ensure that imported players with, say five or ten years’ service, are not discarded for younger players; clubs can show them loyalty and allow them to finish their careers at their club.
The cap could then be reduced as it is only applying to non juniors.
These two points may improve the salary cap system but I believe that a better idea is a points quota for imports (imports being players from another club whether they are Australian or not).
Firstly, I would dictate that all NRL clubs should be associated with a country and interstate league region and that these regions would form part of the clubs junior territory along with its traditional territory.
Then any club could only import players worth so many points – with the points being decided on by a system that awards points for the level that a player has obtained. e.g. an Origin player is worth more points than a non-origin player and a player with five years first grade experience is worth more points than a rookie etc.
The down side of such a points system would be arriving at a consensus of how many points players are worth and this issue alone may be a reason that this type of system will never get introduced.
A very worthy upside of a points system is that a points system cannot be cheated like the salary cap can.
The Storm and the Bulldogs would never have been able to build up winning teams with illegal payments as the amount of points each player was worth would be published for all to see. It would be much easier to enforce as well.
The clubs would then be successful based on their own juniors but with the allowance for a ‘top up’ of imported players.
I thought about the prospect of having an increased import quota for the teams that finish at the bottom of the comp, but this could lead to tanking at the end of the season and so I do not see it as a viable option.
As for the NRL’s second reason for introducing the cap…
This is basically to ensure that the rich clubs don’t buy all of the good players and that poor clubs don’t go broke trying to compete. But why stop clubs going broke?
Before you decry this idea, think about it. Does the game want financially irresponsible clubs as a part of the league? These clubs use up the NRL’s cash resources in attempts to ensure their survival.
I do not believe that having no ceiling on player payments under a points quota for imported players would lead to higher wages.
In fact it would help to keep them wages stable as clubs would be limited in how many players they could purchase.
Thus reducing the demand for imported players and so creating a market where poorer clubs can survive alongside the richer clubs.
Once a club has reached their points quota they may have millions of dollars in the bank but cannot use it to lure more players as their quota will have been used up.
Similarly, the wages of young junior players will not skyrocket out of control either as they will have lost their main bargaining tools for higher wages – that is, other clubs making them big offers to change allegiances which they can use to gain a pay rise from their current club.
This quota system, while still allowing players to move to other clubs, will encourage them to stay at their own junior club.
The salary cap is by the NRL’s definition designed to ‘spread the playing talent’ but why should clubs that develop good junior players lose them to rich clubs – or to any other club for that matter?
Do we want to encourage clubs to develop and keep their own juniors?
I think that we do.
So, to do this we need firstly have all NRL clubs associated with country and interstate league regions as part of their own juniors and then scrap the cap and limit the number of imported players through a points quota and thus encourage clubs to not only develop their own juniors but allow them to keep them.
Clint
Guest
If it was considered that way i.e. where you played the majority of junior years, a system that rewards junior development could potentially favour geographically isolated teams with large junior areas (Broncos, Knights, Storm etc.) over teams with a smaller number of junior clubs (e.g. most Sydney clubs). I think the definition of a junior should include those players who are recruited at SG Ball stage (or similar) and developed from there on if it is to work fairly.
Statler and Waldorf
Roar Guru
It's a tough one to answer. In the article I was looking at the big picture but the devil is always in the detail. Juniors would need to be defined in a way that is easily followed. It could be a combination of where you played and for how long i.e. the majority of your junior years?
Clint
Guest
When we refer to a club's junior development, are we referring to those players who try out for a junior representative side (e.g. SG Ball) and play on with the club from there? Or are we referring to players who played out their junior years in a club's junior district? The reason I ask is that some geographically remote teams (Brisbane, Melbourne, Newcastle etc.) have pretty large districts to source players from.
Sleemo
Guest
Agreed - it's a professional sporting league. Look at the Premier League, the NBA, the NHL - how many of its players are playing for what would be their "junior" club? I do however think that clubs should have some sort of reward for developing their own talent - but the days of teams being by and large made up of local juniors are long gone.
Pot Stirrer
Guest
You cant have a professional sporting competition and run it ameturly by restricting clubs to local juniors. Who would the countless country players be assigned to as a junior ?
Pot Stirrer
Guest
I thought it was Terry Hill ?
Clint
Guest
+1 Sleemo. Teams like Broncos and Knights, for example, have large areas containing many teams from which to recruit talented players that would still be classed as juniors. The Roosters, for comparison, have four junior teams http://www.roosters.com.au/junior-league. Despite this advantage, the Knights have managed to let go some amazing talent (take Boyd Cordner as one example) and yet bought in most of the team we saw on the field in the finals this year (more imported players than the other four major finalists). Ironically, some of the players (Rochow, Mason) were Newcastle region players that were overlooked as juniors. http://www.theroar.com.au/2013/09/26/is-it-possible-to-buy-an-nrl-premiership/
Clint
Guest
What Don said. Plus, they let go Braith Anasta, Mose Masoe, BJ Leilua and Brad Takairangi, spent bugger all on recruiting in 2012, and have a number of players who don't have a clause in their contract allowing them to get a salary increase when the cap goes up as it did this year by $800000: http://www.smh.com.au/rugby-league/sydney-roosters/cap-guns-roosters-reap-recruitment-rewards-20130214-2efv9.html
Statler and Waldorf
Roar Guru
good idea - the Dragons beat Souths to nme one team who would benefit from that
Statler and Waldorf
Roar Guru
the draft was tried in league in the 70s (?) and was legally challenged buy a Balmain player (Dennis Tutt?) as a restraint of trade - and he won the case.
Statler and Waldorf
Roar Guru
hi Mushi i don't for one minute believe that the NRL clubs shoulder any of the junior development burden, hence why I am suggesting a way that will make them take some interest as they will need the juniors. Not sure that playing sport for a living is slavery We could go back to the everyman for himself system and end up with 4 or 5 teams playing.
Sleemo
Guest
+1. Couldn't agree more. On the juniors issue, people who regularly complain about clubs such as the Broncos, Cowboys and/or Warriors having their players cherrypicked by other clubs need to realise that the blame lies with them first and foremost. If the Broncos had wise recruiters and were properly coached and managed, they would have the best 17 in the country as their first team. Instead they let gun juniors (Cherry-Evans, Matt Ballin, Cameron Smith, Cooper Cronk, Anthony Milford, Ben Hannant, Steve Price as examples) go as juniors and then jump up and down when these players excel at other clubs.If the Broncos had better talent identification and retention programs, many of these players may not have ended up elsewhere. Blame the salary cap for not being able to keep them all but the game is survival of the fittest - and in the modern era, that means picking the best players available to you wherever they come from. But local juniors are right under a club's nose and it's the Broncos fault for letting a few of them - who could have been the difference between sustained premiership success rather than regular finals failure and one Premiership in the past 12 years - go in the first place.
Johan
Guest
The Cap must be kept but increased so stars stay in the NRL but the comp is not too predictable. The TV money should be used to ensure that each club has a salary cap of 10 million. If that happens no more defections to rugby union as players would be on good coin.
john badseed
Guest
Some clubs (e.g. Manly, Storm) have great talent scouts like Crusher. They identify talent in the bush or NSW Cup//Qld Cup and bring them to the club. The next step is that the club has to have a strong system and that the players really want to be winners and not show ponies. These journeyman players are given specific roles and either buckle down and show their worth or hit the road. Some (Glenn Stewart, Ryan Hoffmann) go on to be world beaters and make these clubs even stronger. On the other hand, clubs with an unlimited supply of juniors have to make sacrifices and choose the junior they believe can go all the way and make the team stronger. Saints for example keep producing great props and centres but tend to keep the wrong ones or have to let promising ones go to keep the likes of Gasnier who keep breaking down or quitting. The Dogs had to choose between Braith and JT and totally blew it. It depends on how the club is run, not monetarily but as a League structure. Rich clubs like the Broncos have all the money but know squat about putting together a winning ethos. Same goes for Parra. Axe the Cap and the superstars will be bought up by the rich clubs but they won't necessarily be winners in the long term unless they can take all the good players and leave none for the other sides. Some teams may have found a way around it but not many are competitive for a decade.
Sleemo
Guest
Manly have a good system in place - not many genuine superstars at the club. Only DCE and Foran could be considered regular international players. The club seems to thrive but holding onto its few key players, padding the rest of the squad with solid first-graders and sometime rep players, attracting rejects from other clubs and promoting youth from within as needed. Melbourne do a similar thing. With four GF appearances and two premierships since 2007, it clearly works well.
Steve
Guest
How about we stop overpaying for bloody football players fullstop.
Hammerhead
Guest
"I thought about the prospect of having an increased import quota for the teams that finish at the bottom of the comp, but this could lead to tanking at the end of the season and so I do not see it as a viable option." Is an option/solution to tanking that maybe: once past mid point of the season if you beat a team above you are rewarded with a player points concession for the following year ? This would ensure lower teams get some gain/advantage following year. I guess Parra would still have struggled to earn points/concessions this year and the current solution seems to be to buy imported ie non junior talent, of which they have an abundance.
Doggies Bro
Guest
Why is they have played for one club for 10 years they should be able to get a lot more than someone who jumps form club to club
IanW
Guest
Just on that, thats how the AFL "veterans list" used to work - its now a flat 100k per player that fits the category. The reason they did it was because the effect of having players like Andrew Johns, Lockyer etc on half pay was just unbalancing.
Sleemo
Guest
I’ve mentioned this on another post about a month or so ago, but here is my solution… To my knowledge, clubs have a 25-man fulltime squad whose wages count towards the salary cap. My system would have the NRL retain the salary cap at a set figure and count only those portions of the players’ wage they were contracted under when they started with that club. “Started with” would mean the point in time at which they were a fulltime contracted player (i.e. top 25) AND made their NRL debut (not one or the other; BOTH at the SAME point in time). A practical (but fictional) example: Player DCE signs with Club M for $100,000 per season. Player DCE makes his debut with Club M whilst under this contract. Any future contract he signs with Club M can be of any value whatsoever, but only $100,000 would count towards the salary cap – so as a reward for their contribution to his development, they can pay him whatever they like. Say Player DCE exceeds all expectations whilst in his first year, winning a premiership, the Rookie of the Year award and earning Kangaroos selection; Club M begins to think “hang on, Player DCE is doing pretty bloody well, we’d better upgrade his contract”; they choose to upgrade his deal to one worth $500,000 per season. Only $100,000 will count towards the salary cap, whilst Club M get to spend whatever they want over and above that amount, and it’s their reward for developing him from a player who was worth only $100,000 to a player who is worth five times that. If, however, DCE were to look around and another club, let’s call it Club BB, makes him an offer…the first contract with the other club would be what counts under that club’s cap. So say Player DCE leaves Club M and signs with Club BB for $500,000 a year; if he makes his debut with them during that contract term, $500,000 will count towards Club BB’s salary cap for that contract. If he signs a later contract with Club BB, for say $600,000, only $500,000 of it will count to the cap. Get it? If a player leaves a club and signs with another club, if the original club wants him back, all bets are off – this “allowance” doesn’t apply. Forget all this stuff about second-tier caps and the like – players who are not yet good enough for a top 25 berth at an NRL club should be free to play at any club that gives them the best opportunity without being constrained by the cap. I mentioned it to a few mates who said it wouldn’t work because clubs could just stockpile juniors and give them a token NRL debut whilst they’re on a $10,000 contract. But my system wouldn’t be triggered in such a case because there is no chance a player on a wage like that would be part of any club’s top 25. There is a minimum wage for each club’s top squad which would rule that possibility out. My proposed system probably does have its flaws but it allows clubs to develop and build players into footballers better than what they were when they first signed with the club…other clubs would have to sacrifice more of their salary cap to entice these players to come over, while the club that put all the work into the player would be able to see some fruits of their labour rather than have it cherry-picked as often as it currently is.