Rumours and Whingers and Occasional Optimism XXIX

[Tommy Coco]

IMO TPAs have to exist (restriction of trade) and they are fine in the current format. The club has to organize them, but cannot guarantee them, so it is the responsibility of the agent to ensure they are sweet (executed). TPAs are as previlent because the club sources these so don't take it away from the club.

The NRL has to be privy to every TPA, if they aren't, the TPA is in breach. This is the thing , along with Watmo's TPA ownership. If we have disclosed them to NRL, we are sweet, if not we have will be at fault.

Inviting guest who eventuate into TPAs into our Corp suites or become vendors will not be an issue because they can have evolved from these beginnings. We can organize TPAs after a contract has signed as has been inferred in some of the catch up deals reported, player contracts are revisited all the time, the two crucial points are including the NRL and not coming from a current sponsor. Every other point can't be faulted.

 

[Barry O'Speedwagon]

Increasing the cap by a mill or two is a far better option, while scrapping Tpa's altogether.

One city teams are continually receiving a leg up. How can a team like the Tigers or eels continually compete with the storm and Broncs on a yearly basis?

The weaker teams have a small window of opportunity (2/3 years) every decade to compete with the best and a chance of premiership glory. While the strongest teams are there week in week out, year in year out.

Let's try and put everyone on a level playing field, so it reduces the temptations of the weaker clubs pushing the boundaries.

You can't scrap TPAs. You can remove reference to them, and completely ignore them, which would be worse than what we've got. But you cannot stop a player receiving benefits from parties outside the club. That will never ever be legal.

 

[IFR33K]

You can't scrap TPAs. You can remove reference to them, and completely ignore them, which would be worse than what we've got. But you cannot stop a player receiving benefits from parties outside the club. That will never ever be legal.

Why? Restraint of trade?

 

[Barry O'Speedwagon]

Why? Restraint of trade?

Yep, basically.

You can certainly stop a player from earning money from an 'incompatible' source/occupation at the same time as they are contracted to an NRL club (e.g. prostitution, gun running, playing another sport, accepting work that doesn't allow them to train fully). But you can't effectively stop them from receiving money from outside sources. And then.....even if you managed to ban some types of payments, the payments could simply be directed to relatives, trusts or other entities from which the player eventually benefits....and a salary cap auditor has no right to look inside those entities.

One advantage of the current system is that it at least encourages disclosure....but it is really hard to prosecute cases where a TPA has both disclosed and undisclosed agreements.....unless of course on of the people involved speaks up. It's hard to find something that you don't know exists.

 

[eel01s]

IMO TPAs have to exist (restriction of trade) and they are fine in the current format. The club has to organize them, but cannot guarantee them, so it is the responsibility of the agent to ensure they are sweet (executed). TPAs are as previlent because the club sources these so don't take it away from the club.

The NRL has to be privy to every TPA, if they aren't, the TPA is in breach. This is the thing , along with Watmo's TPA ownership. If we have disclosed them to NRL, we are sweet, if not we have will be at fault.

Inviting guest who eventuate into TPAs into our Corp suites or become vendors will not be an issue because they can have evolved from these beginnings. We can organize TPAs after a contract has signed as has been inferred in some of the catch up deals reported, player contracts are revisited all the time, the two crucial points are including the NRL and not coming from a current sponsor. Every other point can't be faulted.

Ah but Tommy, the clubs are not supposed to organize them. Everything is supposed to be done at arms length. Which is why I suggested that the NRL be the organizing party once a contract has been registered. After all, the sponsor theoretically supports the player regardless of which club he plays for. And of course, pigs fly.

 

[84 Baby]

I've lost my alternate cap suggestion, but I've tweaked it a little so basically first level of "cap" is centrally employed by NRL and tiered, that way when things go wrong the NRL has more scope to have players change from breaching club to non-breaching club. Not foolproof but better than the NRL & media shitting themselves. From there club recruitment comes down to convincing players to accept lower tier or better contract length, and then convincing sponsors to tip money to players. Above that cap level, clubs then must send money back to NRL which is forwarded to other non over cap players dollar for dollar.
Also any "breach" penalties are first applied to this last level of cap which will even out the comp better than deducting points from breaching teams. If you go above that top cap level, then you lose all points

 

[Tommy Coco]

Ah but Tommy, the clubs are not supposed to organize them. Everything is supposed to be done at arms length. Which is why I suggested that the NRL be the organizing party once a contract has been registered. After all, the sponsor theoretically supports the player regardless of which club he plays for. And of course, pigs fly.

Well that's what is being asserted by some media but I don't reckon the NRL have made it that ambiguous. The club has to organize them, it's mentioned everywhere that they do. The arms length thing is as instructive as "how long is a piece of string", so I'm convinced that's taken out of context too.

The disclosure to the NRL is the key thing, AFAIAC

 

[84 Baby]

Well that's what is being asserted by some media but I don't reckon the NRL have made it that ambiguous. The club has to organize them, it's mentioned everywhere that they do. The arms length thing is as instructive as "how long is a piece of string", so I'm convinced that's taken out of context too.

The disclosure to the NRL is the key thing, AFAIAC

Arm's length is whether you would have paid/received a similar amount of money in dealing with anybody else. In effect Steve Sharp could have dipped into his own pocket and paid someone an arm's length amount. Except when in terms of non-marketable transactions, it's difficult to determine transaction value so there is a perception/deeming of non-arm's length.
The reasoning behind non-disclosure will determine our fate.
But then again we are basing everything off what media is saying so really we have no clue

 

[Barry O'Speedwagon]

The NRL's public guidelines don't expressly prohibit the club from having any role in a TPA (i.e. there is no reference to the word 'organising'), but they cannot have a role in negotiating them:

"Unlimited - Players can earn unlimited amounts from corporate sponsors who are not associated with the club and who do not use the game's intellectual property (no club logos, jerseys or emblems) provided these are pre-approved. These agreements may not be negotiated by the club as an incentive for a player to sign a contract, nor can they be guaranteed by the club."

https://www.nrl.com/nrlhq/referencecentre/salarycap/tabid/10434/default.aspx

So, if someone came to the club and said "I'd like to sponsor one of your players, could you suggest someone", I don't see that would necessarily breach the guidelines above....as long as the club then had no further role until the deal was ready to be registered with the NRL.

 

[TheRam]

But what is the alternative?

We can't legally stop players earning money elsewhere. Everyone recognises that the current system isn't great, but I don't see too many suggestions of workable (and legal) alternatives. About the only thing that would fix this particular problem would be a massive increase in the salary cap, or abandoning the cap completely (which would cause problems of their own).

What, so you haven't heard of the points system that Politis & co vehemently are apposed to cause it would f**k up their cushy little advantage?

It would stop all this crap and make the comp totally transparent. But hey, who wants that?

 

[Avenger]

The NRL's public guidelines don't expressly prohibit the club from having any role in a TPA (i.e. there is no reference to the word 'organising'), but they cannot have a role in negotiating them:

"Unlimited - Players can earn unlimited amounts from corporate sponsors who are not associated with the club and who do not use the game's intellectual property (no club logos, jerseys or emblems) provided these are pre-approved. These agreements may not be negotiated by the club as an incentive for a player to sign a contract, nor can they be guaranteed by the club."

https://www.nrl.com/nrlhq/referencecentre/salarycap/tabid/10434/default.aspx

So, if someone came to the club and said "I'd like to sponsor one of your players, could you suggest someone", I don't see that would necessarily breach the guidelines above....as long as the club then had no further role until the deal was ready to be registered with the NRL.

This is the grey part of the NRL and their f**king TPA's that I would contest in court if they even took half a point. They can f**k themselves. Injunction time. I'd disrupt the whole season seeing they are disrupting ours for some shit that mainly happened 2 to 3 years ago.

 

[Barry O'Speedwagon]

This is the grey part of the NRL and their f**king TPA's that I would contest in court if they even took half a point. They can f**k themselves. Injunction time. I'd disrupt the whole season seeing they are disrupting ours for some shit that mainly happened 2 to 3 years ago.

Yeh, but this only the 'public guidelines'. Presumably there is a more comprehensive set of rules in existence, which is not made public......for what reason I don't know.

 

[Avenger]

Yeh, but this only the 'public guidelines'. Presumably there is a more comprehensive set of rules in existence, which is not made public......for what reason I don't know.

That doesn't wash with me. If we are complaint in 2016. How can they punish us for 2016? It doesn't make sense and is illogical and wrong. They keep comparing us to the Dogs and Storm yet they were non compliant in the year they were penalised. We are under the cap. Even if Choc's contract is contentious the man hasn't played a game since July 2015. We if anything are owed dispensation for that not a penalty.

 

[emjaycee]

Regardless of the whether he has played in 2016 or not, IF Choc's TPA is illegal it will (and should) be counted under this years cap. In fact both the 2015 and 2016 values could be applied to this years cap and there are precedents for this I believe.

IF the total of these put us over the cap this year then technically, the current squad was assembled illegally and docking points in 2016 is a valid penalty.

 

[Tommy Coco]

So, if someone came to the club and said "I'd like to sponsor one of your players, could you suggest someone", I don't see that would necessarily breach the guidelines above....as long as the club then had no further role until the deal was ready to be registered with the NRL.

Right, but even if it the transaction is completely steered by parra, "thanks new potential sponsor, 20k does bugger all in terms of sponsorship of the club, but let's get you paying semi that money and we'll get him out to your office twice this year for a promo event."

Nothing is in breach so long as the agent gets the contract executed and the NRL knows. We have driven that entire transaction and I can't see us being in breach of it goes this way.

Even further, parra starts pissing on fires after 3P and navigates these salary cap pressures by setting heaps of these little arrangements into action at the same time as re-negging the current contracts. If you can do it once, within the rules of the game, where is the breach doing it two dozen times? If we have these sponsorship relationships, as do dogs, Broncos , rabbits, roosters, then all the twisted , out of context , media reports dont create conviction, as long as the NRL knows .

 

[IFR33K]

We realeased Pauli before the season kicked off. If they include watmoughs tpa's in the cap, we may still be under.

I just don't understand the delay... Surely they aren't waiting till after next weeks Sydney blockbuster to make an announcement. If they were concerned about ratings, they should just leave our points alone.

 

[Tommy Coco]

Regardless of the whether he has played in 2016 or not, IF Choc's TPA is illegal it will (and should) be counted under this years cap. In fact both the 2015 and 2016 values could be applied to this years cap and there are precedents for this I believe.

IF the total of these put us over the cap this year then technically, the current squad was assembled illegally and docking points in 2016 is a valid penalty.

Sharp has stated if they deem game cube (or whatever it's called) too close to a sponsor , we'll stick it in his Included salary cap.

This indicates it isn't that much, to me anyways. Also as I have been banging on, if we can cut another TPA, then we'll just shift it there, or another player to relieve the new included Watmo salary.

 

[Tommy Coco]

I just don't understand the delay... Surely they aren't waiting till after next weeks Sydney blockbuster to make an announcement. If they were concerned about ratings, they should just leave our points alone.

I'm prolly going to be severely disappointed here, but I think the delay is the greater implications of our case. We may do things worse than other clubs, but I reckon all TPAs (NRL wide) will be affected if they deem ours as in breach.

 

[Poupou Escobar]

Regardless of the whether he has played in 2016 or not, IF Choc's TPA is illegal it will (and should) be counted under this years cap. In fact both the 2015 and 2016 values could be applied to this years cap and there are precedents for this I believe.

IF the total of these put us over the cap this year then technically, the current squad was assembled illegally and docking points in 2016 is a valid penalty.

I certainly hope so.

 

[Parraren]

I reckon the total amount of the 3rd party deals isn't that big a number.