Salary Cap Question

[skyline]

I read somewhere that there won't be a salary cap in 2007. Can anyone explain to me the purpose of this, and what it means for that year in football? What's a year without the salary cap going to look like?

[The_Next_Big_Thing]

As it stands, there won't be a cap because the NFLPA and the Owners haven't redone the collective bargaining agreement yet. Trust me, neither of them wants a year without the CBA. There will be a cap in 2007, there just isn't one scheduled yet.

[Whur CHad At?]

There better be, The NFL will suck if they don't have one.

[HoosierCat]

Even if it happens, there's less to the uncapped year than meets the eye. The guy over at profootballtalk.com had an item on it a few weeks back, I'll see if I can find it, but the bottom line is that there are all sorts of restrictions written into the CBA on what teams can and can't do in the uncapped year. Stuff like, teams who were in the playoffs the year before can only sign their own FAs and not any from other teams.

[HoosierCat]

Here's some stuff I pulled from the pft archives...

UNCAPPED YEAR WILL LIMIT ELITE TEAMS

As the 2005 free-agency spending spree continues to unfold, more details are emerging regarding the realities of the looming uncapped year, which under the current collective bargaining agreement will occur in 2007.

Although, on the surface, the notion of no salary cap is a bonanza for players, we've recently reviewed the reality that the threshold for hitting the market will move from four years of service to six.

And there are more provisions that will, as a practical matter, limit the ability of players to cash in on this cash cow.

For example, each team will have in 2007 an extra transition player designation. Under current rules, teams can use either a franchise or a transition designation. In 2007, the additional transition tag creates a right of first refusal in exchange for a one-year average salary equal to the top ten salaries at the player's position or 120 percent of his 2006 salary, whichever is greater.

More importantly, the final eight playoff teams from 2006 will be limited in their free agency activities in 2007. In other words, the rich won't be permitted to go out and try to get richer by spending their riches. Richly.

Specifically, the teams in the conference championship games will be permitted only to sign their own unrestricted free agents or unrestricted free agents off of waivers. They each also may sign an unrestricted free agent for each unrestricted free agent lost to another team.

The next four teams (the losers in the divisional round) will be limited as well, plus one unrestricted free agent with a 2007 salary of $1.5 million or more and others with a first-year salary of less than $1 million (not including the signing bonus).

The final eight teams may sign franchise and transition players without limitation.

Finally (for now), there's some good news for the NFL cheapskates in 2007. Just as there's no ceiling on player spending that year, there's also no floor.

As we learn more about the realities of the uncapped year, we become even more convinced that the NFL and the union will work out a deal before then. The grass of the uncapped season isn't nearly as green for the players as first blush might suggest, but there are obvious reasons for the owners to try prevent guys like Dan Snyder and Jerry Jones from throwing cement mixers full of cash at every available free agent.

THE REALITIES OF THE UNCAPPED YEAR

At the annual agents' meeting conducted in Indy on Friday, we heard that plenty of time was spent talking about the current collective bargaining agreement -- and specifically regarding the lure of the so-called "uncapped" year, which under the terms of the current CBA will occur in 2007.

Although the union believes that the NFL will do everything it can to extend the CBA and avoid the season without a salary cap (which would on at least a short-term basis inject baseball's big-market/small-market dynamic into football), there's concern among the agents regarding the fact that, in the uncapped year, the requirement for unrestricted free agency moves from four years of service to six.

So after the 2006 season, players who otherwise would have been eligible for unrestricted free agency based on having four or five full seasons in the league would be restricted free agents only, subject to the three-level tender rules that provide a maximum one-year salary of $1.9 million, which is far cry from the one-year franchise tenders that otherwise would apply.

Our guess is that few players or agents have taken this dynamic into account when determining the lengths of contracts that they have signed.  Because the only guys who'll truly be unrestricted are players who were drafted in 2001 or earlier -- and whose contracts expire following the 2006 season.

But what about the flood of unrestricted free agents who hit the market every year because they've been cut?  The primary motivation for many of these moves is the salary cap.  Without a cap in place in 2007, teams might be more willing to keep a guy who's making what otherwise would be too much money, thereby keeping him from hitting a market that promises to be far more lucrative than usual.