Future of the Salary Cap?

[BFritz21]

The salary cap went up by 16.5 million from '05 to '06, then was relatively stable for a few years, and then has gone up by 10 million each of the last two years.

My question is, when does it stop? Will it continue to just go up until the top tier players are making even more insane amounts of money than they are now?

Seems weird to me that I don't think normal people's salaries are increasing at these exponential rates, so how is it rational that the athletes' salaries are?

I realize that the owners are billionaires and have change to spare, but will it ever stop or will top tier football players just become some of the richest in the country?

[CKwi88]

(02-15-2016, 09:30 PM)BFritz21 Wrote: The salary cap went up by 16.5 million from '05 to '06, then was relatively stable for a few years, and then has gone up by 10 million each of the last two years.

My question is, when does it stop?  Will it continue to just go up until the top tier players are making even more insane amounts of money than they are now?

Seems weird to me that I don't think normal people's salaries are increasing at these exponential rates, so how is it rational that the athletes' salaries are?

I realize that the owners are billionaires and have change to spare, but will it ever stop or will top tier football players just become some of the richest in the country?

I think that the salary cap is adjusted annually based on the revenue of the league. The NFL is quite extremely profitable, so it makes sense that it goes up every year and consistently. 10 is a whole mess of money to average joes like (I imagine) the vast majority of us are around here. But ten million when distributed among the entire roster of a team isn't all that much (in comparison.) 

Contracts in the NFL have steadily been going up for superstar players, and that's not likely to change. The precedent set by San Francisco in how they dealt with Kaepernick was interesting though. I think that the whole escalators deal with less guaranteed will be more prominent for the mid and next level players, and the top tier players will always make good money. 

You'll probably still see some athletes in the list of the top paid entertainers, but remember, it's not only the football players getting richer. Once you have that kind of money, you have to screw up pretty bad to lose it. 

[BFritz21]

(02-15-2016, 10:02 PM)CKwi88 Wrote: I think that the salary cap is adjusted annually based on the revenue of the league. The NFL is quite extremely profitable, so it makes sense that it goes up every year and consistently. 10 is a whole mess of money to average joes like (I imagine) the vast majority of us are around here. But ten million when distributed among the entire roster of a team isn't all that much (in comparison.) 

Contracts in the NFL have steadily been going up for superstar players, and that's not likely to change. The precedent set by San Francisco in how they dealt with Kaepernick was interesting though. I think that the whole escalators deal with less guaranteed will be more prominent for the mid and next level players, and the top tier players will always make good money. 

You'll probably still see some athletes in the list of the top paid entertainers, but remember, it's not only the football players getting richer. Once you have that kind of money, you have to screw up pretty bad to lose it. 

Great post.  Rep.

I know it's not that much over the entire roster, but I guess I'm wondering if the contracts for the top players (specifically QBs) are going to keep being larger than the ones before them?

It seems that every big quarterback wants a deal that tops all other QBs to that point, and I'm just wondering if it's ever going to stop?

If the top QB, and even the top RB, WR, etc., all say "I want more money than the best guy got before me," then will the contracts just keep growing?  Will we have players making insane amounts of money per year?

[J24]

The cap will only continue to go up because..
1.) Sports are really the only thing people still watch live so advertisers love them.
2.) the league is starting to become global so that equals more money.
3.) They just got a new team in LA which will gain more money.

[fredtoast]

(02-16-2016, 01:01 AM)J24 Wrote: The cap will only continue to go up because..
1.) Sports are really the only thing people still watch live so advertisers love them.
2.) the league is starting to become global so that equals more money.
3.) They just got a new team in LA which will gain more money.

This.  The cap will continue to go up.  and it will cause some players who sign long term deals to be "underpaid" in the final years of these contracts.

An interesting thing is about to happen in the NBA.  There cap is going up by a huge amount this year.  Since teams have so much money to spend average players who happen to hit the market this year will get ridiculous salaries.  It is going to throw the pay scale off balance on a lot of teams.  Average players are going to be paid better than spome of the better players in the league.