Rumoured Signings

[Colk]

I just struggle to see how anyone can suggest the salary cap is working as intended if the team at the top of the ladder can sign rep players from bottom 4 teams for a pie and a coke

Nail meets head. As I said earlier, the salary cap doesn’t work because there’s an implied notion that $400k from the Storm/Roosters is the same as $400k from the Tigers/Bulldogs when it clearly isn’t.

This is not meant to be a slur on Coates or on the Storm because 99.9% of people would do the same thing in the same situation but in order for any system to function properly there needs to be an appropriate push/pull factor so there needs to be a second mechanism in place for the talent to be better spread et al draft/salary cap in other codes (although I’m definitely not in favour of an AFL style draft - I’d be more inclined to go with a notional value system or a hard cap on how much you can spend on outside players and a flexible cap on players developed or maybe apply both of these systems at the same time)

At least with this system as well, you can easily police it which is another big problem of using just a salary cap

 

[mongoose]

Nail meets head. As I said earlier, the salary cap doesn’t work because there’s an implied notion that $400k from the Storm/Roosters is the same as $400k from the Tigers/Bulldogs when it clearly isn’t.

This is not meant to be a slur on Coates or on the Storm because 99.9% of people would do the same thing in the same situation but in order for any system to function properly there needs to be an appropriate push/pull factor so there needs to be a second mechanism in place for the talent to be better spread et al draft/salary cap in other codes (although I’m definitely not in favour of an AFL style draft - I’d be more inclined to go with a notional value system or a hard cap on how much you can spend on outside players and a flexible cap on players developed or maybe apply both of these systems at the same time)

At least with this system as well, you can easily police it which is another big problem of using just a salary cap

But the Storm lost Ado Carr, a better player, does this not factor in?

Sorry but I don't believe clubs must pay some fixed market value for all players. If a player wants to stay at a particular club for less than they can get else where then too bad for other clubs. Now if said player is getting additional payments outside of the salary cap then that is a huge issue.

 

[Captain Apollo]

Nail meets head. As I said earlier, the salary cap doesn’t work because there’s an implied notion that $400k from the Storm/Roosters is the same as $400k from the Tigers/Bulldogs when it clearly isn’t.

This is not meant to be a slur on Coates or on the Storm because 99.9% of people would do the same thing in the same situation but in order for any system to function properly there needs to be an appropriate push/pull factor so there needs to be a second mechanism in place for the talent to be better spread et al draft/salary cap in other codes (although I’m definitely not in favour of an AFL style draft - I’d be more inclined to go with a notional value system or a hard cap on how much you can spend on outside players and a flexible cap on players developed or maybe apply both of these systems at the same time)

At least with this system as well, you can easily police it which is another big problem of using just a salary cap

Why do people harp on about salary caps being "talent distributors"? Fact is that was never the intent, especially in rugby league. It was introduced in rugby league by the NSWRL to try and avoid clubs spending themselves into bankruptcy.

Secondly, you can have the best designed talent spreading mechanisms ever designed and you will still wind up with teams with poor rosters. Why? As you cannot guarantee that those making recruitment/retention decisions will always make the correct decisions. Have a look at a number of US sports where some teams have been perennial underachievers due to bad recruitment/retention/draft decisions.

Finally you have to take into account certain legal rulings which limit what types of mechanisms can be introduced. Like 'em or not they exist.

Anyway, we are going off topic for this thread.

 

[jack coburn]

Do we go and try the points system although there will be much conjecture about the gradings.

 

[Captain Apollo]

Tex Hoy to the Penrith Panthers?

Awkward silence over Eels skipper’s contract; Raiders to lock in star trio: Transfer Whispers

‘We’re waiting...’ Awkward silence over Eels skipper’s contract; Raiders to lock in star trio

www.foxsports.com.au

 

[Colk]

But the Storm lost Ado Carr, a better player, does this not factor in?

Sorry but I don't believe clubs must pay some fixed market value for all players. If a player wants to stay at a particular club for less than they can get else where then too bad for other clubs. Now if said player is getting additional payments outside of the salary cap then that is a huge issue.

Warranted this might not be the best example but the only people who don’t think the system isn’t screwed are Roosters and Storm fans who can’t see beyond their own team’s reflection

The problem with the salary cap is that it is impossible to police correctly in of itself: the only time that clubs have been actually caught is from internal whistleblowers. At least with a notional points system (not a salary) it would be at least totally transparent.

Second it goes beyond an ethical debate of what somebody or someone should earn (I am actually having against a hard cap - although people who also argue against a draft conveniently forget a salary cap is also a restraint of trade) so spare me that argument; my argument is regarding the integrity of the competition.

Have you not noticed that in the past 20 years we have seen what 80% of grand finals have been competed by at least one of two teams. So to ask: would you prefer to have the Storm or the Roosters compete exclusively in the next 20 grand finals as well?

Why do people harp on about salary caps being "talent distributors"? Fact is that was never the intent, especially in rugby league. It was introduced in rugby league by the NSWRL to try and avoid clubs spending themselves into bankruptcy.

Secondly, you can have the best designed talent spreading mechanisms ever designed and you will still wind up with teams with poor rosters. Why? As you cannot guarantee that those making recruitment/retention decisions will always make the correct decisions. Have a look at a number of US sports where some teams have been perennial underachievers due to bad recruitment/retention/draft decisions.

Finally you have to take into account certain legal rulings which limit what types of mechanisms can be introduced. Like 'em or not they exist.

Anyway, we are going off topic for this thread.

Firstly, I am acutely aware of the original intention of the salary cap.

Your second claim is absolute f****** crap and only a supporter for a team that is profiting from that said system would ever have the temerity to argue that position. Have you seen two teams sit at the top end of the competition for almost all of the past twenty years - the only competitions that are worse are European soccer competitions so this idea that it spreads talent is a bald faced lie. All the salary cap does is thin talent for the bottom end of the competition

 

[Dogs Of War]

Nail meets head. As I said earlier, the salary cap doesn’t work because there’s an implied notion that $400k from the Storm/Roosters is the same as $400k from the Tigers/Bulldogs when it clearly isn’t.

This is not meant to be a slur on Coates or on the Storm because 99.9% of people would do the same thing in the same situation but in order for any system to function properly there needs to be an appropriate push/pull factor so there needs to be a second mechanism in place for the talent to be better spread et al draft/salary cap in other codes (although I’m definitely not in favour of an AFL style draft - I’d be more inclined to go with a notional value system or a hard cap on how much you can spend on outside players and a flexible cap on players developed or maybe apply both of these systems at the same time)

At least with this system as well, you can easily police it which is another big problem of using just a salary cap

I will throw one to you. Bulldogs had Foran who hardly played in his time at the Dogs. International player. Who assigns points for this situation? When do they get reviewed, yearly? Could clubs put pressure on the guys who nominate a points system to reduce their value? Points system is arguably worse than any salary cap, and you would still need to have a salary cap anyway to stop clubs hurting themselves.

What would be better is to move more to a NFL style cap where you must spend 90% of your cap in any one year, but 95% of your cap over 5 years. This would allow clubs down the bottom of the table to save some cash up, and get those players who will cost them a touch more to come to such a team, without sacrificing the rest of the squad. This would probably work better in the NRL than it does in the NFL.

 

[Captain Apollo]

Warranted this might not be the best example but the only people who don’t think the system isn’t screwed are Roosters and Storm fans who can’t see beyond their own team’s reflection

The problem with the salary cap is that it is impossible to police correctly in of itself: the only time that clubs have been actually caught is from internal whistleblowers. At least with a notional points system (not a salary) it would be at least totally transparent.

Second it goes beyond an ethical debate of what somebody or someone should earn (I am actually having against a hard cap - although people who also argue against a draft conveniently forget a salary cap is also a restraint of trade) so spare me that argument; my argument is regarding the integrity of the competition.

Have you not noticed that in the past 20 years we have seen what 80% of grand finals have been competed by at least one of two teams. So to ask: would you prefer to have the Storm or the Roosters compete exclusively in the next 20 grand finals as well?



Firstly, I am acutely aware of the original intention of the salary cap.

Your second claim is absolute f****** crap and only a supporter for a team that is profiting from that said system would ever have the temerity to argue that position. Have you seen two teams sit at the top end of the competition for almost all of the past twenty years - the only competitions that are worse are European soccer competitions so this idea that it spreads talent is a bald faced lie. All the salary cap does is thin talent for the bottom end of the competition

Firstly, you don't know me at all so do not put words in my mouth thank you. I cab recall when my club was a basket case in the late 1980s thru to the mid-1990s. I saw up close what was needed to get us out of that mire, a lot of hard work and some very tough decisions. In terms of teams near the top, go ask the NY Yankees, the Boston Redsox, the New England Patriots, the Pittsburgh Steelers. All play in leagues which have drafts, salary caps, yet those 4 organisations have been near the top in their sports for decades.

You can't legislate equality if people who run an organisation are poor decision makers.

 

[Colk]

First of all I’m arguing for something in correlation with the salary cap; you know like every other competition in the world has done (barring soccer) And guess what those competitions have a proper ebb and flow - you know a team has a window for say five years and then they rebuild for say five years.

That example is simple: In the case with Foran, you would take the points off the club so they could buy a replacement player worth that amount of points. Or you could choose to offset for a future time.

That’s just one option: you could also apply a hard cap on players that were recruited from outside the club, but have a soft cap when applied to your own juniors.

In lieu of a draft which the RLPA have said they do be against due to legal complications, you have to have a secondary measure attached to it in order for the salary cap system to function better

The third case already happens to a degree in RL. You have to spend a certain amount of the cap. Case in point was the Newcastle Knights about five years ago.

 

[Colk]

Firstly, you don't know me at all so do not put words in my mouth thank you. I cab recall when my club was a basket case in the late 1980s thru to the mid-1990s. I saw up close what was needed to get us out of that mire, a lot of hard work and some very tough decisions. In terms of teams near the top, go ask the NY Yankees, the Boston Redsox, the New England Patriots, the Pittsburgh Steelers. All play in leagues which have drafts, salary caps, yet those 4 organisations have been near the top in their sports for decades.

You can't legislate equality if people who run an organisation are poor decision makers.

I don’t follow NFL so I wouldn’t have an idea about that competition. Yankees I’ll definitely give you although they’ve been quiet for about a decade or so. Even in those competitions I doubt they would have been competing in 80% of grand finals for the last twenty years, of the claim that a salary cap in isolation is the best talent spreading option in the world is patently false and bemusingly so; that’s the reason why I thought you had to be biased.

The best example I can give you is the AFL - I hate that game so I’m sorry to bring it up. Teams might win a couple in a row or something like that but they drop down and go through a rebuilding period. The teams at the bottom then have a chance at the top - it has its flaws but the bottom teams have a better chance than ours.

I’ll leave you with a question: can you not predict the top five or six next season and can you really see it changing in the next five years say?

 

[hrundi99]

I will throw one to you. Bulldogs had Foran who hardly played in his time at the Dogs. International player. Who assigns points for this situation? When do they get reviewed, yearly? Could clubs put pressure on the guys who nominate a points system to reduce their value? Points system is arguably worse than any salary cap, and you would still need to have a salary cap anyway to stop clubs hurting themselves.

What would be better is to move more to a NFL style cap where you must spend 90% of your cap in any one year, but 95% of your cap over 5 years. This would allow clubs down the bottom of the table to save some cash up, and get those players who will cost them a touch more to come to such a team, without sacrificing the rest of the squad. This would probably work better in the NRL than it does in the NFL.

Foran would be put on LTIR and the value he has on the cap (whether dollars or points) is excused from the club's limit. They can add an extra player or players up to the value of his cap % for the period of time he is unavailable.

 

[hrundi99]

Firstly, you don't know me at all so do not put words in my mouth thank you. I cab recall when my club was a basket case in the late 1980s thru to the mid-1990s. I saw up close what was needed to get us out of that mire, a lot of hard work and some very tough decisions. In terms of teams near the top, go ask the NY Yankees, the Boston Redsox, the New England Patriots, the Pittsburgh Steelers. All play in leagues which have drafts, salary caps, yet those 4 organisations have been near the top in their sports for decades.

You can't legislate equality if people who run an organisation are poor decision makers.

MLB doesn't have a salary cap mate... It's a tax system that teams with money can exploit given they have the cash to do it.

 

[mongoose]

Warranted this might not be the best example but the only people who don’t think the system isn’t screwed are Roosters and Storm fans who can’t see beyond their own team’s reflection

The problem with the salary cap is that it is impossible to police correctly in of itself: the only time that clubs have been actually caught is from internal whistleblowers. At least with a notional points system (not a salary) it would be at least totally transparent.

Second it goes beyond an ethical debate of what somebody or someone should earn (I am actually having against a hard cap - although people who also argue against a draft conveniently forget a salary cap is also a restraint of trade) so spare me that argument; my argument is regarding the integrity of the competition.

Have you not noticed that in the past 20 years we have seen what 80% of grand finals have been competed by at least one of two teams. So to ask: would you prefer to have the Storm or the Roosters compete exclusively in the next 20 grand finals as well?



Firstly, I am acutely aware of the original intention of the salary cap.

Your second claim is absolute f****** crap and only a supporter for a team that is profiting from that said system would ever have the temerity to argue that position. Have you seen two teams sit at the top end of the competition for almost all of the past twenty years - the only competitions that are worse are European soccer competitions so this idea that it spreads talent is a bald faced lie. All the salary cap does is thin talent for the bottom end of the competition

I don't disagree that the comp seems unfair at the moment and I do believe many Rugby League fans have Storm and Roosters fatigue, especially the Storm. I think their dominance is starting to really harm the NRL product. In saying that I don't think their advantages in the last 5 years or so is due to the salary cap not working or them able to secure talent unfairly. I hate to say it but I just think they are an extremely professional outfit, they are spot on with their recruitment, retention, fitness and training and they know how to take advantage of the rules better than most clubs. Roosters are similar. It's interesting that both clubs are in areas which aren't League heartland, perhaps this extra competition with other codes has pushed them to be better?

 

[Captain Apollo]

I don't disagree that the comp seems unfair at the moment and I do believe many Rugby League fans have Storm and Roosters fatigue, especially the Storm. I think their dominance is starting to really harm the NRL product. In saying that I don't think their advantages in the last 5 years or so is due to the salary cap not working or them able to secure talent unfairly. I hate to say it but I just think they are an extremely professional outfit, they are spot on with their recruitment, retention, fitness and training and they know how to take advantage of the rules better than most clubs. Roosters are similar. It's interesting that both clubs are in areas which aren't League heartland, perhaps this extra competition with other codes has pushed them to be better?

Considering neither the Roosters nor Storm have big (numerically speaking) junior competitions to draw from, to survive they've had to invest a lot in their recruitment, retention and scouting. If they didn't then they would not be competitive. Too many clubs rely on having a large junior nursery thinking that will guarantee them success. The Parramatta Eels tried that thru the early to mid-1990s thinking that because they'd had Ella, Kenny, Grothe etc come thru their junior ranks that they'd have no problem in finding replacements from their own junior ranks as they were sure to come thru.

That's why the turn around for Parramatta in 1997 was notable with the influx of Pay, McCracken, Smith and Dymock adding to the talent there which, with a change of coach, saw them reach the semis for the first time since Peter Sterling had retired. Even Penrith rested on its laurels to an extent on this issue until the last few years.

Also look at some bad recruitment or retention decisions. Canterbury reckoned Daniel Tupou, a Bulldogs junior, was not good enough to play junior reps. The Eels told him he was not good enough to be a first grade player. Canterbury knocked back the opportunity to sign both Latrell Mitchell and Connor Watson before the Roosters signed them both. There are others but those are a few doozies I'm aware of.

 

[Colk]

I don't disagree that the comp seems unfair at the moment and I do believe many Rugby League fans have Storm and Roosters fatigue, especially the Storm. I think their dominance is starting to really harm the NRL product. In saying that I don't think their advantages in the last 5 years or so is due to the salary cap not working or them able to secure talent unfairly. I hate to say it but I just think they are an extremely professional outfit, they are spot on with their recruitment, retention, fitness and training and they know how to take advantage of the rules better than most clubs. Roosters are similar. It's interesting that both clubs are in areas which aren't League heartland, perhaps this extra competition with other codes has pushed them to be better?

Quite a good argument. I will definitely agree with you regarding the professionalism of both the Storm and the Roosters - I don’t think that’s ever really in question.

I will argue though the salary cap is ineffective on a few counts

1. It is incredibly hard to police, in fact as you have seen the ease in which the Bulldogs and Storm paid over the cap, the extent and in the Storm’s case the duration of the rort shows it is near on impossible. The only reason that those two were caught were due to rather disgruntled or concerned ex-employees.

2. The salary cap doesn’t factor in location, it doesn’t factor in juniors and development - it doesn’t factor in anything really. The blind assumption that a dollar equals a dollar wherever you go is completely oblivious to aspects of location and how desirable it is, connection to business and corporates et al. This is made even worse with the introduction of TPA’s. Essentially the salary cap is anti-regional and incredibly inflexible. You only have to look at the a few teams that have dominated to join the dots.

3.) It is antithetical to expansion. The only way in which you can properly expand the competition, particular to areas that aren't a RL area is through a draft or something concurrent to a salary cap. Even the Dolphins in a strong RL area and with a coach like Wayne Bennett are reduced to offering ridiculous over the market rates

4.) Player managers have way too much power. How many players in the last few years have essentially leaned on a club to get a release and immediately gone to a club for more money. Contracts should mean something - at least if you have a points system or have a cap on recruitment you wrestle some control back from player managers and back to clubs

My last point on the salary cap is this. If you go back to the cap post Super League was much lower with had one particular distinct effect: the issue of money was more significant. If you are an above average player and your current club offers $300k and a competitor offers you $500k, the increase is a lot greater 66%; if on the other hand, your current club is offering you $600k and a competitor offers you $750 or $800k, the increase in dollar terms is the same but the real increase is a lot less and you would be more inclined to stay in the second option. Now this is not to disparage players earning more money, but the more money you have in a system the more advantages wealthier clubs or the clubs currently doing well on the field ; unless you put in place a secondary counter balancing mechanism in place

 

[Captain Apollo]

The reason why a draft may struggle is that as the clubs run most of the junior leagues, which actually develop players, and not the NRL, the NSWRL nor the QRL, why would they continue funding those comps if the best players left via a draft? I mean do you think the Panthers would have anything like its current roster if you had a development draft? Its one of the reasons that many clubs do not want it, especially those with large junior nurserys.

 

[Smug Panther]

The reason why a draft may struggle is that as the clubs run most of the junior leagues, which actually develop players, and not the NRL, the NSWRL nor the QRL, why would they continue funding those comps if the best players left via a draft? I mean do you think the Panthers would have anything like its current roster if you had a development draft? Its one of the reasons that many clubs do not want it, especially those with large junior nurserys.

The real fix is giving clubs a reason to develop players. Any junior you develop should get a 50% cap discount.....watch the f**king money flow into the grass roots then

 

[Colk]

The real reason the draft would struggle is the RLPA are against it.

Regards the junior development argument, my contention is that the current system doesn’t work for a variety of reasons.

On another matter apologies Captain Apollo. I was probably a little hasty in my assumptions earlier. My concern is only in making sure there is a real ebb and flow in the on field success and the failure as that is the only way people will maintain interest in the competition because unlike other countries, we have a particularly competitive sports and entertainment market

 

[gerg]

The real fix is giving clubs a reason to develop players. Any junior you develop should get a 50% cap discount.....watch the f**king money flow into the grass roots then

Exactly. Give clubs a good reason or incentive to improve junior development and then they'll all do it, to some degree. And you would think that it is bound to improve the talent pool and help with expansion.

 

[myrrh ken]

How do you think the roosters and storm would go if there was no salary cap?