The actual use-case of the NFL Salary Cap.

[Villain The Foe]

I've been having quite the entertaining conversation with numerous posters who are concerned about how cap expenditures should be spent regarding Jets good/elite players. 

I think that it would be best to remind folks that money to a franchise is looked at and used much differently than us common folk who work for money and have to properly manage that money. How teams access money is much different, and the purpose for those funds are much different. Common folk typically spend money in order to pay bills and to maintain their lifestyle. Teams spend money in order to buy players rights in order to win. A team's cap space isnt based on their own personal revenue that they made for the season. The league has a collective bargaining agreement in place and the hard cap is based on numerous revenue streams such as contracts with television networks, tickets sales and merchandise for example. 

Pretty much every year the cap number goes up. In 2020 the Salary is about 200 million dollars per team. Now compare that to when this salary cap was introduced back in 1994 when the cap was first put in place at 35 million dollars per team. That's almost a 6X increase in cap over the past 26 years. My point here is this. The purpose of the salary cap isnt to "Nickel and Dime" your way into obscurity. The purpose is to spend the money to keep your current good players and to pay free agents. 

I constantly here this rhetoric of not paying our All-Pro safety his market value because he's a safety and that would be bad economics, or not paying market value for Robby Anderson (Free Robby, by the way) because of trumped up arrests of 2+ years ago that folks make out to be as if it was this past weekend...and it would be bad economics to invest in a WR that has been our best WR since he's been in the league, and we've only paid him about 4 million over the 4 years he's been in the league. 

 

My problem is this. I keep hearing about economics or wisely spending our cap, but our two best players have both been on rookie deals for years. We have a QB on a rookie deal. We dont have a LT on a huge deal, we dont have an Edge rusher on a huge deal and the CB we did give a large contract to we're about to terminate. And speaking of huge deals, the players with the highest contracts have all been guys from other teams that we signed via free agency. 

Mosley 17.5M (Ravens)

Bell 15M (Steelers)

T. Johnson 15M (Rams)

Crowder 10M (Redskins)

H. Anderson 8.3M (Colts)

 

Matter of fact, the highest salary we have on the books from an original drafted player is Sam Darnold at 8.2M! The highest salary that we have from an original Jet player that we resigned is Quincy Enunwa at 7.8M, and he's right behind Sam Darnold. You know who's behind Enunwa? Quinnen Williams, at 7.3 Million. 

Do you know why we always have so much cap space? It's because we rarely hit on draft picks. And because of the lack of overall talent due to rarely hitting on draft picks, whatever money we do decide to spend we have to then overspend to get guys such as CJ Mosley, a 17.5M Price tag that Harbaugh looked at and said "Let him walk". Why did they say that? Because the Ravens were in a situation to where they had to be more prudent with their money given that they had to figure out who is more important for them to keep around (knowing that they'll need future space to keep Ronnie Stanley and Marhsall Yanda)  and what players would be more impactful additions (S Earl Thomas and CB Marcus Peters). They were able to do this now that they had Flacco off of the books and have a QB drafted 30-something overall on the 2nd year of his rookie deal. 

 

My point is this. The Jets are in no position to be weighing financial options or nickel and dime'ing the good players that they actually drafted. The REAL PURPOSE for the cap is to pay the good players that you originally drafted! Every position has it's market and within that market you have guys who will fit in a range. There would be no point of even having a salary cap if it couldnt meet the market value of players when that market value is based on the salary cap itself. 

Would Russel Wilson be averaging 35 million dollars a year if the Cap was the same cap that it was in 1994 when it was first introduced??? Of course not. It's one thing to manage your cap in order to make sure you're not just grossly overpaying players. It's another to make it seem like you cant pay all pro Safeties because of their market value when their Market value is based on the cap itself and the Jets are top 10 in salary cap space. It makes no sense whatsoever. 

Lastly, I've heard examples of how signing Revis and Sanchez were bad decisions. Indeed they were, but they weren't based on economics but incompetency. The year that we should have resigned Revis, we traded him. Then he bounced from Tampa Bay to New England...playing fantastic football during that time, and then 3 years later the Jets want to then give him a contract that they should have given him 3 years ago in his prime. That's not a bad signing because of numbers, that's a bad signing because of a bad front office. The Jets gave Sanchez an extension because his feelings were hurt that Tanny tried to get Peyton Manning from the Colts, and when he failed Sanchez got pissy and then they gave him an extension. Again, that wasn't bad numbers, but a bad front office decision, to extend a guy who you didn't even believe in to begin with. 

The most hilarious thing that I cant bring myself to understand. So many people have criticized paying Robby because prior production (Though he grossly outperformed his contract) along with past history with the law...while at the same time folk will criticize paying Jamal Adams because he's a Safety (who also grossly outperformed his contract) and because he's too confident in himself and comes off as a "fake" team guy....yet he has never had any issue with law enforcement nor has ever been considered a "locker room cancer". 

 

The Salary Cap is meant to be spent. This is why they have a rule that it's a requirement to spend a high percentage of that cap every few years, in order to make sure that teams aren't just sitting on the funds and not trying to pay players who either deserve it that they drafted, or guys in free agency. The rule helps facilitate market prices for the players. 

There is literally no excuse in terms of "Not being able to afford a Safety" given it's position when we're not spending money anywhere else, especially at premium positions. If anything, this would be the perfect time to pay guys at these position while getting guys at the premium positions at rookie contract prices. This is how you win in the league, by spending the money wisely. This is the perfect opportunity to keep Adams while knowing that you can draft an LT/RT, and maybe still be able to get an edge in free agency given the amount of money we have available. Teams should be wishing that they can be in a position to pay a Strong Safety market prices, that means that they can work on getting their premium position together and pay them rookie prices. 

When it's time to pay your rookie QB 25-35 million a year and your edge rusher 20 million, that's when you start worrying about paying All-Pro Strong Safeties. 

 

You dont let all pro players walk when you have no talent, a bunch of rookie contracts on the books and a ton of money. Let's be real here and understand the purpose of the Salary Cap. 

[nycdan]

You'll take some bullets over this, but I would say I agree with the overall point and many of the specifics.  The purpose of drafting players is surprisingly not so you can turn around and trade the ones that are actually good for more draft picks as if the picks themselves were the end game.  I think some people here have lost sight of that. 

The league will always determine 'market rate' for various positions.  Paying market rate for a top-5 Safety isn't a mistake in a vacuum and as you said, we are not anywhere near the cap situation where we can't afford to keep our guys (i.e. Vikings). 

Now strap on your flame-retardant underwear because the fun is probably going to start very soon.

[joewilly12]

The NY Jets don't have much to show from #1 picks over the last 10 years, but we finally get a great one and certain posters hate and want to trade hm. 

51 years and counting.........................

[Villain The Foe]

3 minutes ago, nycdan said:

You'll take some bullets over this, but I would say I agree with the overall point and many of the specifics.  The purpose of drafting players is surprisingly not so you can turn around and trade the ones that are actually good for more draft picks as if the picks themselves were the end game.  I think some people here have lost sight of that. 

The league will always determine 'market rate' for various positions.  Paying market rate for a top-5 Safety isn't a mistake in a vacuum and as you said, we are not anywhere near the cap situation where we can't afford to keep our guys (i.e. Vikings). 

Now strap on your flame-retardant underwear because the fun is probably going to start very soon.

Thanks. I'm listening to folks give their reasons on why they wouldnt resign a guy, and it all sounds as if the league is strapped for funds. These are not organizations living check to check. 

Also, the NFL has to be the only pro league where the contracts themselves arent even fully guaranteed.  I even forgot to mention that part. So most of these contracts dont even be real in terms of real money being spent. 

[jmat321]

The next CBA - they should really push to make players a franchise drafts exempt from the salary cap AFTER their rookie deal expires.  The purpose of the salary cap should be to prevent teams from buying championships.  You shouldn't be punished for drafting well.  

[nico002]

The biggest fallacy to me, is this idea that you can't win with a QB outside of his rookie deal. This is only a factual statement if your team uses 100% of the cap and no player on the roster is expendable. More times than not, an elite level QB is easily worth the extra 10-20 million in cap space that he will command. 

[Villain The Foe]

25 minutes ago, jmat321 said:

The next CBA - they should really push to make players a franchise drafts exempt from the salary cap AFTER their rookie deal expires.  The purpose of the salary cap should be to prevent teams from buying championships.  You shouldn't be punished for drafting well.  

I see your point, but then it defeats the purpose of the salary cap and shows favoritism, in a league that already favors the quarterback. If you're a team that's able to draft well and you cant seem to find enough cap space to sign that 1 guy, then no worries. Remember, you're an organization who drafts well. There is no guy that valuable that you cant ultimately replace. It may not be of that high of talent, if he's like a once in a generation type of talent", however, if you've built a complete team, then you're in a position to compensate. 

Instead of exempting the cap, which would undermine the point of the cap, how about guaranteeing contracts? Alot of times guys may not sign with a team because of contract language, knowing that the deal could be 5 years 100 million, but only 40 million is guaranteed and only 35 million is "fully" guaranteed. The contract language in the league is utter bullcrap. The League needs to pay those guys. 

Guarantee the contracts. 

[nycdan]

15 minutes ago, nico002 said:

The biggest fallacy to me, is this idea that you can't win with a QB outside of his rookie deal. This is only a factual statement if your team uses 100% of the cap and no player on the roster is expendable. More times than not, an elite level QB is easily worth the extra 10-20 million in cap space that he will command. 

Well once Mahomes signs, that differential will be more like $30MM+ but I still agree with your point.  You just have to be above average at drafting so you have at least some over-performing talent on your team (i.e. good players on rookie deals).

[Barry McCockinner]

[Beerfish]

The Jets pay  or are about to pay players that do not help you win in this league or their skill set is easily replaced. 

We signed two injured ilbs to big contracts, they both got hurt and had little effect on the team.

We now want to make a huge commitment to our safety but the his effect on the team and any of his gaudy stats will plummet as soon as we get an actual pass rusher or two and he is asked to do what most SS in this league do.

We don;t draft positions of value and we miss on most of those picks anyways.

[Barry McCockinner]

I wholeheartedly agree with the sentiment and points made in this thread and it was very well articulated.

I want to make a side point about the salary cap in general. I don't think it has really done anything to improve parity in the league. It was introduced in '94 and 6 years later the Patriots created the longest dynasty in the history of the league. Personally I thought it was more fun to watch teams be able to keep all the good guys they drafted and be rewarded with a nice 5-10 year run for doing so. It gave them more of an identity than just the face of the QB and coach.

 

[ZachEY]

That is a lot of ******* words to say, "we have the money to pay Jamal Adams."

[joewilly12]

5 minutes ago, TeddEY said:

That is a lot of ******* words to say, "we have the money to pay Jamal Adams."

Most need a thorough explanation. 

Nice job @Villain The Foe

[Villain The Foe]

4 minutes ago, joewilly12 said:

Most need a thorough explanation. 

Nice job @Villain The Foe

Thanks Joe! 
When folks don't understand why we have the money to pay Jamal Adams, the only thing left to do is to explain it. 

[jetstream23]

44 minutes ago, Barry McCockinner said:

I wholeheartedly agree with the sentiment and points made in this thread and it was very well articulated.

I want to make a side point about the salary cap in general. I don't think it has really done anything to improve parity in the league. It was introduced in '94 and 6 years later the Patriots created the longest dynasty in the history of the league. Personally I thought it was more fun to watch teams be able to keep all the good guys they drafted and be rewarded with a nice 5-10 year run for doing so. It gave them more of an identity than just the face of the QB and coach.

 

I'd like to see a tweak to the Salary Cap rule that incentivizes teams to keep their own players.  Maybe when you re-sign one of your Draft picks  you only have to count 90% of his compensation against the Cap?  Do something that makes a $10M per year offer to your own player only count $9M against the Cap, whereas another team incurs the full $10M against their Salary Cap spend to sign him away.  This would let a team pay their own guy a little more to stay yet still feel less of the Cap pain.  It's essentially a reward for Drafting well.

[Untouchable]

I don’t really care whether we have the money to sign Adams longterm or not.

If the price is right, I trade him.

And I don’t hate Jamal.

But myself and many others look at this team, see completely anemic talent along the OL, WR position, potentially RB, EDGE and CB.

And as good as Jamal Adams is, we’d rather accrue extra draft capital to address those areas, support our young franchise QB to the fullest extent possible and not devote $15-16 million a year to a very good player who happens to play possibly the least important position this side of fullback.

If I can get a 1st and 3rd from a team like Dallas, then so long Jamal.

Grabbing a potential #1 WR and a starting OL piece with those extra added picks would go a helluva lot further in reversing this teams fortunes than keeping Jamal Adams around. But that’s just me.

[CTM]

46 minutes ago, nico002 said:

The biggest fallacy to me, is this idea that you can't win with a QB outside of his rookie deal. This is only a factual statement if your team uses 100% of the cap and no player on the roster is expendable. More times than not, an elite level QB is easily worth the extra 10-20 million in cap space that he will command. 

Where the issue is that ok/good QBs like Cousind are given monster deals. Not really an issue with paying truly elite guys 

[ZachEY]

4 minutes ago, Villain The Foe said:

Thanks Joe! 
When folks don't understand why we have the money to pay Jamal Adams, the only thing left to do is to explain it. 

I could walk into a dealership and walk out with the keys to a Ferrari this afternoon.  That I can doesn't mean I should.

[joewilly12]

4 minutes ago, TeddEY said:

I could walk into a dealership and walk out with the keys to a Ferrari this afternoon.  That I can doesn't mean I should.

You would rather visit 15 used car dealers and kick the tires on all junks instead of driving a reliable luxury car that takes you from point A to point B safely. 

[nycdan]

6 minutes ago, CTM said:

Where the issue is that ok/good QBs like Cousind are given monster deals. Not really an issue with paying truly elite guys 

Right.

KC will pay Mahomes $40MM and while it's a huge #, it won't be hard to swallow.

If DAL has to pay Dak anywhere near that amount, it will be like drinking battery acid because of the difference between the two.  Mahomes elevates a team.  Prescott merely goes along for the ride and plays to not screw things up.  One you can pay $40MM for.  The other, you should only pay $20MM for because you need to make that difference up with other players, and that's only if you can't find a better option.

[Villain The Foe]

6 minutes ago, TeddEY said:

I could walk into a dealership and walk out with the keys to a Ferrari this afternoon.  That I can doesn't mean I should.

Facts. You have to properly assess. If you have Champagne taste, but beer money, then walking out with a Ferrari will only mean that you'll have it for 30 days until you cant make next month's payment. 

Just because you can do something doesnt mean that you should. However, that isnt the Jets situation. 

[ZachEY]

2 minutes ago, joewilly12 said:

You would rather visit 15 used car dealers and kick the tires on all junks instead of driving a reliable luxury car that takes you from point A to point B safely. 

In your analogy, which comically misses the point, Jamal Adams is a Hummer H2.

[Villain The Foe]

@Dcat Finally wrote it. ?

[joewilly12]

1 minute ago, TeddEY said:

In your analogy, which comically misses the point, Jamal Adams is a Hummer H2.

Comically is your logic that we can't afford Jamal Adams or don't need players on our roster like him. 

[ZachEY]

1 minute ago, Villain The Foe said:

Facts. You have to properly assess. If you have Champagne taste, but beer money, then walking out with a Ferrari will only mean that you'll have it for 30 days until you cant make next month's payment. 

 Just because you can do something doesnt mean that you should. However, that isnt the Jets situation. 

But, what if  I can make the payments.  But, once I've done that, I can't say, get another quality car that has room for my children.  Upgrade my apartment.  Go on the vacations I want to go on.  It's a percentage of resources.  Jamal Adams' contribution to the Jets winning isn't worth the percentage of resources he will cost long term.  We have actually seen that 1st hand, as three years of Jamal Adams hasn't produced a winning season.  And, just because, today, we can technically afford to make a poor allocation of resources, doesn't mean we should.

[ZachEY]

5 minutes ago, joewilly12 said:

Comically is your logic that we can't afford Jamal Adams or don't need players on our roster like him. 

5-11, 4-12, 7-9.

I'm pretty sure we can continue to lose without Jamal Adams.  That your understanding of what makes a football team good is players who's name you recognize, doesn't really change that.

[Bugg]

Put it this way; if my choice is paying Ju Ju Smith Shuster $17 million or pay that kind of $ to Jamal Adams, I'm paying Ju Ju, coming off an injury, and not looking back. One position contributes to winning football games way more than the other. And one of those slots can be replaced without much dropoff relatively reasonably, and one cannot. Not a knock on Adams, a statement of fact and allocation of your cap. 

[Augustiniak]

5 minutes ago, TeddEY said:

5-11, 4-12, 7-9.

I'm pretty sure we can continue to lose without Jamal Adams.  That your understanding of what makes a football team good is players who's name you recognize, doesn't really change that.

it's a funny thing, but when you view contracts in terms of wins and losses, most guys are relatively easily replaceable, and we saw this on defense this year.  

[ZachEY]

The 49ers pay their SS 6.5M per

The Packers pay their SS 9M per

The Titans pay their SS 6M per

The Chiefs pay their SS 4M per

The most expensive SS in the league is employed by the team picking 2nd overall, at 14M per.

[ZachEY]

1 minute ago, Augustiniak said:

it's a funny thing, but when you view contracts in terms of wins and losses, most guys are relatively easily replaceable, and we saw this on defense this year.  

Agreed.  So, lets not allocate significant resources to a SS, who, as demonstrated above, the final 4 teams spend an average of a little over 6M on.

[Augustiniak]

2 minutes ago, TeddEY said:

The 49ers pay their SS 6.5M per

The Packers pay their SS 9M per

The Titans pay their SS 6M per

The Chiefs pay their SS 4M per

The most expensive SS in the league is employed by the team picking 2nd overall, at 14M per.

how many times a year does a head coach think 'wow, that safety really beat us today'?

[nycdan]

19 minutes ago, TeddEY said:

But, what if  I can make the payments.  But, once I've done that, I can't say, get another quality car that has room for my children.  Upgrade my apartment.  Go on the vacations I want to go on.  It's a percentage of resources.  Jamal Adams' contribution to the Jets winning isn't worth the percentage of resources he will cost long term.  We have actually seen that 1st hand, as three years of Jamal Adams hasn't produced a winning season.  And, just because, today, we can technically afford to make a poor allocation of resources, doesn't mean we should.

Ah, the "we can't win it all with Jamal Adams and 52 scrubs" argument.  

Khalil Mack wasn't on a winning team this year.  Neither was Von Miller.  Or TJ Watt.  You could swap Adams for any one of those guys and we aren't a playoff team.  But you need a certain amount of those type of guys or you never will be.  Accumulate great players until you can't afford them all and then worry about who to let leave.  Right now we can afford all one of the great players we have on this team.  Or we can trade him for the unknown of a mid-1st round pick that could easily turn out to be....say a Garrett Bradbury, who is a very average-looking Center taken with the 20th pick last year.  If you could easily turn Jamal Adams into Quenton Nelson, than I'm all for it.  But there's a lot of ways that can just make the team substantially worse, and draft history (especially ours) says you can't ignore that possibility.

 

[Augustiniak]

1 minute ago, TeddEY said:

Agreed.  So, lets not allocate significant resources to a SS, who, as demonstrated above, the final 4 teams spend an average of a little over 6M on.

watching the playoffs, you realize that while there are different ways teams get to the playoffs, most have at least decent offensive lines, and quarterbacks aren't usually getting hammered every other play.  most of these teams have several competent wrs/tes and rbs who can take a screen pass and show some wiggle to get YAC.  the jets have none of this.  none.

[Barry McCockinner]

8 minutes ago, TeddEY said:

5-11, 4-12, 7-9.

I'm pretty sure we can continue to lose without Jamal Adams.  That your understanding of what makes a football team good is players who's name you recognize, doesn't really change that.

By this logic we shouldn't pay a single player on the roster. 

Adams can get paid and we can still improve the o-line, skill positions, coaching staff, etc and become a good team. Paying Adams doesn't prevent us from drafting o-line. It doesn't prevent us from paying Darnold in the future if he is worth it. It doesn't prevent us from doing pretty much anything we need to do to improve the team.
 

[nycdan]

4 minutes ago, TeddEY said:

The 49ers pay their SS 6.5M per

The Packers pay their SS 9M per

The Titans pay their SS 6M per

The Chiefs pay their SS 4M per

The most expensive SS in the league is employed by the team picking 2nd overall, at 14M per.

The 49ers pay their top-3 WRs an average of about $3MM/year.  The highest paid WR in the league is on CLE.

KC pays their top-3 CBs and average of about $600k/year.  The highest paid CB in the league is on CHI.

Clearly we're onto a winning formula.  Or maybe not.