Insurance and cap relief

[Gaffneycatch81]

Probably many of you have seen this article already, but I have not seen it discussed here so thought I’d post it.

https://www.espn.com/nfl/story/_/id/41274295/nfl-insurance-policies-star-players-aaron-rodgers-tua-tagovailoa-jared-goff-joe-burrow-christian-mccaffrey

I was not aware of this loophole in the cap (basically, if a team buys insurance on a player for injury or illness, the premium does not count against the cap, but if the insurance pays out, it DOES count as credit to towards the cap). So for owners willing to pony up for the insurance, it’s basically a way of buying cap space (since you have to assume that at least some of the policies will pay out given the injury rate in the NFL).

Of course, Woody and the Jets are one of the teams opting not to take advantage of this loophole, so we lost out on major cap dollars we could have gotten this year for the Rodgers injury last year. Ugh … this owner is such a cheap clown.

[Asymmetrical]

Just now, Gaffneycatch81 said:

Probably many of you have seen this article already, but I have not seen it discussed here so thought I’d post it.

https://www.espn.com/nfl/story/_/id/41274295/nfl-insurance-policies-star-players-aaron-rodgers-tua-tagovailoa-jared-goff-joe-burrow-christian-mccaffrey

I was not aware of this loophole in the cap (basically, if a team buys insurance on a player for injury or illness, the premium does not count against the cap, but if the insurance pays out, it DOES count as credit to towards the cap).

Of course, Woody and the Jets are one of the teams opting not to take advantage of this loophole, so we lost out on major cap dollars we could have gotten this year for the Rodgers injury last year. Ugh … this owner is such a cheap clown.

I, for one, am shocked that Woody is a shortsighted oaf. 

 

[Warfish]

I love the presumption that it was the Owner being cheap, not the GM failing to plan for an injury to the old QB. 

Owners don't personally handle insurance for players, or management of the cap, that's the GM's job.

Lets be honest, anything good "yay GM!", anything bad "Boo, Owner sucks!" tends to be the mantra here at JN.

Same as last year the "owner forced Rodgers on GM" talk, but if Rodgers is great this year it'll be "GM is so brilliant for getting Rodgers despite the Owners objections", lol.

[Gaffneycatch81]

2 minutes ago, Warfish said:

I love the presumption that it was the Owner being cheap, not the GM failing to plan for an injury to the old QB. 

Owners don't personally handle insurance for players, or management of the cap, that's the GM's job.

Lets be honest, anything good "yay GM!", anything bad "Boo, Owner sucks!" tends to be the mantra here at JN.

Same as last year the "owner forced Rodgers on GM" talk, but if Rodgers is great this year it'll be "GM is so brilliant for getting Rodgers despite the Owners objections", lol.

Did you read the article?

[Gaffneycatch81]

14 minutes ago, Gaffneycatch81 said:

Did you read the article?

If you had read it, you would see that it’s not a huge leap to assume that this was discussed (basically, all teams know the option is there and discuss it — certainly for large contracts), and several execs say it is, in almost every case (with the possible exception of one or two teams that insure many players contracts — the Jets are not one of those teams)  the owner’s call. Which makes sense — why would any GM not be willing to spend the owner’s money (again — the premium doesn’t count against the cap) for a chance of picking up additional cap space.

Additionally, it says that Rodgers previous contract (that the Jets inherited) included an insurance addendum that the Jets opted not to pick up, and that several insurance brokers reached out to the Jets about insuring the contract, but the Jets didn’t return the calls. Again, why would JD not want to spend Woody’s personal (as opposed to salary cap) money?

So, yes, “let’s be honest” about the mantras here — the Warfish mantra of “I’m smarter than everyone else and going to disdainfully throw cold water on everyone else’s assertions without even informing myself on the topic.”

Edit: I forgot to add the “lol” at the end … lol.

[Asymmetrical]

10 minutes ago, Warfish said:

I love the presumption that it was the Owner being cheap, not the GM failing to plan for an injury to the old QB. 

Owners don't personally handle insurance for players, or management of the cap, that's the GM's job.

Lets be honest, anything good "yay GM!", anything bad "Boo, Owner sucks!" tends to be the mantra here at JN.

Same as last year the "owner forced Rodgers on GM" talk, but if Rodgers is great this year it'll be "GM is so brilliant for getting Rodgers despite the Owners objections", lol.

the article pretty clearly states that it's almost always an ownership decision.

[Rich Thornburgh]

14 minutes ago, Asymmetrical said:

I, for one, am shocked that Woody is a shortsighted oaf. 

 

Shortsighted?  How much you wanna bet the shadow GM Woody Johnson wasn’t even aware he could do it?

[Asymmetrical]

Just now, Rich Thornburgh said:

Shortsighted?  How much you wanna bet the shadow GM Woody Johnson wasn’t even aware he could do it?

ugh good point lol

[Rich Thornburgh]

12 minutes ago, Warfish said:

I love the presumption that it was the Owner being cheap, not the GM failing to plan for an injury to the old QB. 

Owners don't personally handle insurance for players, or management of the cap, that's the GM's job.

Lets be honest, anything good "yay GM!", anything bad "Boo, Owner sucks!" tends to be the mantra here at JN.

Same as last year the "owner forced Rodgers on GM" talk, but if Rodgers is great this year it'll be "GM is so brilliant for getting Rodgers despite the Owners objections", lol.

Most owners are busy managing their actual companies that made them billionaires and delegate football ops to professionals.  Woody inherited all his money and has no real business ventures so he’s your de facto Vice President of Football Operations 

[JoeNamathsFurCoat]

1 hour ago, Rich Thornburgh said:

Most owners are busy managing their actual companies that made them billionaires and delegate football ops to professionals.  Woody inherited all his money and has no real business ventures so he’s your de facto Vice President of Football Operations 

btw, is that Clarence Boddicker (your profile pic)?

why not Steve Minh? 🤣

[batman10023]

1 hour ago, Gaffneycatch81 said:

Did you read the article?

clearly he didn't read the article

[JoeNamathsFurCoat]

4 minutes ago, batman10023 said:

clearly he didn't read the article

did you have fun in Nashville?

[Warfish]

1 hour ago, Gaffneycatch81 said:

Did you read the article?

Yes, I did.  I didn't see any reference as to who made the decision.

If I missed it, and it named Woody as the decision maker, my bad.  

[Warfish]

1 hour ago, Gaffneycatch81 said:

....it’s not a huge leap to assume....

Oh ok, so the article didn't name anyone as the decision maker, you're assuming it was Woody.  

[Gaffneycatch81]

2 minutes ago, Warfish said:

Oh ok, so the article didn't name anyone as the decision maker, you're assuming it was Woody.  

That is correct. I don’t know for a fact it was Woody. I am just basing my assumption on logic and the numerous sources in the article that clearly state owners make the call on insuring contracts, as I stated above. Rarely on a fan message board are opinions based on indisputable facts and I fully admit that I am basing mine on a fact- and logic- based assumption.

[FidelioJet]

In reading this article I can't believe I (and seemingly many of you) wasn't aware of it.

I'm not even sure this is correct.  I mean had the Jets had insurance we would have had an extra $37mm in cap space this year?  I feel like that's not the type of thing that could he kept quit as the article suggests.  

The CBA labels insurance proceeds as a "refund from the player," which qualifies the amount as a cap credit for the club for the following season. In the simplest terms, if a player who eats up a significant portion of a club's salary cap misses significant time with injury or illness, a club doesn't have to take it as a total loss, but can recover space for the following year. Plus, insurance premium payments don't count against the salary cap.

 

I

[FidelioJet]

If this article and my understanding of it is accurate - this isn't just a small loop hole but a massive way to artificially increase your cap (as there are always injuries)

If the Jets aren't taking advantage of this (and I don't care if it's the owner or the GM) it clear, to me anyway, they are more about money than winning and they are doing a disservice to their fans.

[Gaffneycatch81]

2 minutes ago, FidelioJet said:

In reading this article I can't believe I (and seemingly many of you)

I'm not even sure this is correct.  I mean had the Jets had insurance we would have had an extra $37mm in cap space this year?  I feel like that's not the type of thing that could he kept quit as the article suggests.  

The CBA labels insurance proceeds as a "refund from the player," which qualifies the amount as a cap credit for the club for the following season. In the simplest terms, if a player who eats up a significant portion of a club's salary cap misses significant time with injury or illness, a club doesn't have to take it as a total loss, but can recover space for the following year. Plus, insurance premium payments don't count against the salary cap.

 

I

The article suggests that most contracts are not insured for the full amount (probably the insurance companies won’t insure the whole contract). In most cases it might be that they get like a $50M payout for a career ending injury on a contract that had, say $100M in guarantees left. But yes, that $50M would be credited to the cap (probably prorated or assigned in pieces to the year it would have been due). The article doesn’t get in to all those details, but I think it’s fair to assume the Jets might have been able to get $15M or $20M of Rodgers $37M credited back to them.

[C Mart]

6 minutes ago, Gaffneycatch81 said:

That is correct. I don’t know for a fact it was Woody. I am just basing my assumption on logic and the numerous sources in the article that clearly state owners make the call on insuring contracts, as I stated above. Rarely on a fan message board are opinions based on indisputable facts and I fully admit that I am basing mine on a fact- and logic- based assumption.

One of the sources in the article was John Idzak.

"Former Jets general manager John Idzik, speaking generally about the five clubs he worked for in his NFL career, told ESPN that ownership approval and buy-in is necessary to purchase an insurance premium.

"At the ownership level, there's a certain way of conducting business," Idzik said. "Some clubs will be more apt to insure and they get used to that, and they see the benefits of it. Others are less apt."

"It's whether or not they're believers in insurance, whether they want to spend the money on it or not," an industry source said.

Sportico reported the Jets haven't done a policy in at least 10 years. Idzik declined to say whether they'd purchased insurance in his two seasons (2013-14) as Jets GM. "It was under discussion anytime we had a big contract," he said.

The Jets declined to comment through a team spokesperson.

Among the other teams that industry sources said don't buy insurance, or have simply opted against it to date, are the Bears, Colts, Panthers and Steelers.""

 

Do people really think the Jets President Hymie Elhai, the Jets cap guys David Socie & Nick Sabella aren't aware of this?  Seriously?!?

 

DAVID SOCIE is in his eighth year with the Jets after returning to the organization in 2018 as the senior director, football administration. His primary responsibilities include offering support to General Manager Joe Douglas and Jets staff in matters regarding player contracts, the team's salary cap, the NFL Collective Bargaining Agreement (CBA) and NFL Rules. He previously served in this role with the Jets during the 2006 season.

NICK SABELLA, now in his sixth season with the Jets, enters his first year as senior director, football administration. Prior to his promotion, Sabella spent two seasons as the assistant director, football administration and three seasons as the manager, football administration. In his role, Sabella's responsibilities include working with General Manager Joe Douglas on matters regarding salary cap management, player contract negotiations, compliance with the NFL Collective Bargaining Agreement (CBA) and NFL Rules, and strategic planning as it relates to player acquisition and roster construction.

[Sperm Edwards]

1 hour ago, Warfish said:

I love the presumption that it was the Owner being cheap, not the GM failing to plan for an injury to the old QB. 

Owners don't personally handle insurance for players, or management of the cap, that's the GM's job.

Lets be honest, anything good "yay GM!", anything bad "Boo, Owner sucks!" tends to be the mantra here at JN.

Same as last year the "owner forced Rodgers on GM" talk, but if Rodgers is great this year it'll be "GM is so brilliant for getting Rodgers despite the Owners objections", lol.

First off, Woody isn't a blind-investor owner. He's the team's CEO. There aren't too many company CEOs oblivious to any $40MM/year investment in any one individual and just shrug it off like it's not important. It doesn't need to be based in cheapness when - on the part of both owner and GM alike - it can be explained away by incompetence and general lack of foresight.

From the article:

According to an insurance industry source, the Jets never returned calls from multiple insurance brokers, including the one who wrote and sold the Packers their policy on Rodgers. The Jets could have negotiated the existing Rodgers policy to insure a reduced portion of the signing bonus, but instead they let the policy go.

Joe Douglas was hired in 2019 as the Jets' general manager from his role as vice president of player personnel for the Eagles, a team that deals in insurance policies more than any other club. But the insurance decision may not have been his to make.

Former Jets general manager John Idzik, speaking generally about the five clubs he worked for in his NFL career, told ESPN that ownership approval and buy-in is necessary to purchase an insurance premium.

"At the ownership level, there's a certain way of conducting business," Idzik said. "Some clubs will be more apt to insure and they get used to that, and they see the benefits of it. Others are less apt."

A club's philosophy on insurance can be influenced by its salary cap staff's analysis, but it's ultimately determined by the owner, who has to be willing to spend their own money on the premium.

The author here isn't some see-no-evil Jets fan hell-bent on excusing every move made by Joe Douglas.  Because as she writes a little further down that the Jets' inactivity in purchasing such policies predates the current GM:

Sportico reported the Jets haven't done a policy in at least 10 years. Idzik declined to say whether they'd purchased insurance in his two seasons (2013-14) as Jets GM. "It was under discussion anytime we had a big contract," he said.

There's little reason for any GM to refuse to take out an insurance policy since it's not his money and it can only serve to benefit GM-type finances (i.e. the team's salary cap).

At least the way this is presented, this is more likely a Woody Johnson thing than a Douglas (or Maccagnan) thing, and probably Idzik and Tannenbaum before him. The Jets didn't get cap relief when Enunwa again got injured & never played again. Ditto when they lost Santonio Holmes for his Lisfranc injury years before.

And not just Rodgers, of late (though he's the biggest single hit as the QB). To him you can add all the other expensive-player half or most or full season injuries from players and there's no evidence the Jets recovered any amount of their salary cap allocation for all the games missed by:

• Enunwa (mentioned above)
• Santonio Holmes (mentioned above)
• Duane Brown (twice!)
• Corey Davis missing like half his time here
• Carl Lawson (twice!)
• CJ Mosley's first season here
• AVT (twice!)
• Fant in 2022
• Becton (twice!)
• Maye playing on the tag in 2021
• Revis in 2012
• Sanchez in 2013
• (probably others I'm forgetting, too)

In fairness they would not have collected on the bulk of contracts - including really bad ones - that didn't result in injury-missed games. For those, the insurance policy would've been a pure loss every time.

Hey, maybe it is all on each GM trying to stay in good graces with the boss by saving him an extra personal tax on the salary cap, but this stuff goes back to Tannenbaum's tenure here so that's a harder sell.

Here's the thing: if Woody gets reimbursed, then there's a cap credit. IOW Woody doesn't keep the insurance money; rather, it gets re-spent on players the next season. That's again something that appeals only to a GM not to an owner.

[Claymation]

2 hours ago, Warfish said:

I love the presumption that it was the Owner being cheap, not the GM failing to plan for an injury to the old QB. 

Owners don't personally handle insurance for players, or management of the cap, that's the GM's job.

Lets be honest, anything good "yay GM!", anything bad "Boo, Owner sucks!" tends to be the mantra here at JN.

Same as last year the "owner forced Rodgers on GM" talk, but if Rodgers is great this year it'll be "GM is so brilliant for getting Rodgers despite the Owners objections", lol.

Former Jets general manager John Idzik, speaking generally about the five clubs he worked for in his NFL career, told ESPN that ownership approval and buy-in is necessary to purchase an insurance premium.

"At the ownership level, there's a certain way of conducting business," Idzik said. "Some clubs will be more apt to insure and they get used to that, and they see the benefits of it. Others are less apt."

[Warfish]

56 minutes ago, Gaffneycatch81 said:

That is correct. I don’t know for a fact it was Woody. I am just basing my assumption on logic and the numerous sources in the article that clearly state owners make the call on insuring contracts, as I stated above. Rarely on a fan message board are opinions based on indisputable facts and I fully admit that I am basing mine on a fact- and logic- based assumption.

I would argue that Woody is not the hands-on, day-to-day, force-things-on-his-GM-his-GM-doesn't-want manager than many on this site claim he is.  As I joked, the community here generally goes full-bore "Woody is a meddler, responsible for all decisions" when things go wrong, and give credit to the GM for any and all decisions when things go right.  

In this case, the decisions to trade for a player rest primarily with the GM.  Knowledge of a players injury history, and likelihood of injury, rests primarily with the GM.  Knowledge of this cap management loophole (which the article implies not everyone in the league was fully aware of and some teams kept somewhat secret) is primarily the responsibility of the GM.  Suggesting to Ownership things to defray perceived on-field cap-based risk is primarily the responsibility of the GM.  Ownership may need to buy in, but the GM has to make a good business-case for these decisions.

Also, the argument that Woody willingly traded for a 100+ million in payroll liability but decided to cheap out on a vastly less expensive insurance policy seems illogical to me.  The trade was the big cost, not the insurance.  Similarly, I've read people here say that the Jets decision to not adequately back up Rodgers last year was also on Woody, not the GM, which also seems a bit silly to me.  What I think is far more logical is a GM who saw formerly iron-man Rodgers as a very low injury risk, and made decisions presuming he would stay healthy, both insurance wise and backup QB wise.

Ultimately, whomever decided decided wrong.  If it's Woody, boo Woody.  If it's the man most responsible for all cap-management and player-personnel decisions, the GM Joe Douglas, then boo Joe.  I just don't agree, in this case, that it's as logic-based to presume meddling cheap Woody instead of the GM.  But as you note, us outside the building likely will never know.

[Gaffneycatch81]

20 minutes ago, Sperm Edwards said:

 

Here's the thing: if Woody gets reimbursed, then there's a cap credit. IOW Woody doesn't keep the insurance money; rather, it gets re-spent on players the next season. That's again something that appeals only to a GM not to an owner.

That was my point exactly when I indicated that Woody was being cheap on this issue. But I certainly did not intend to turn this thread into a Woody vs JD argument. The more interesting point, imo, is that this exists because I had never heard of it.

[PFSIKH]

It sounds like it could be a benefit if the team is judicious in their spending.  

The Jets, for example, could have given Sauce an extension this year.  Or sign a player like Ridley.  

Otherwise, you are ballooning their cap space to 292 million this year.  Then hoping the cap is relatively close to that in 2025.  Chances are it is a good 20 million or so south of it.  

[Gaffneycatch81]

45 minutes ago, Warfish said:

 

In this case, the decisions to trade for a player rest primarily with the GM.  Knowledge of a players injury history, and likelihood of injury, rests primarily with the GM.  Knowledge of this cap management loophole (which the article implies not everyone in the league was fully aware of and some teams kept somewhat secret) is primarily the responsibility of the GM.  Suggesting to Ownership things to defray perceived on-field cap-based risk is primarily the responsibility of the GM.  Ownership may need to buy in, but the GM has to make a good business-case for these decisions.

Ultimately, whomever decided decided wrong.  If it's Woody, boo Woody.  If it's the man most responsible for all cap-management and player-personnel decisions, the GM Joe Douglas, then boo Joe.  I just don't agree, in this case, that it's as logic-based to presume meddling cheap Woody instead of the GM.  But as you note, us outside the building likely will never know.

I agree with the bolded — which is why, until the last sentence of my original post, I said “the Jets and Woody” when referring to failure to take out insurance.

I don’t agree that there is any reason to question that every owner in the NFL is aware of this option. Several font office sources or former GMs, including Idzik, say it was routinely discussed. And it was part of the Rodgers contract they inherited. And the article states the Jets got phone calls from insurance brokers trying to sell them a policy on Rodgers. So, the idea that a high level decision maker — particularly a guy who has owned the team for over 20 years — is not fully aware of the option and it’s implications is very far-fetched to me. The secrecy around it in the league is, in my opinion, more likely an effort to keep it quiet due to fan reaction if they don’t have a contract insured — conceivably, an owner who doesn’t mind spending his own money to win could insure every player on the roster, and recoup cap dollars every year if he wanted to in the interest of winning, and I’d imagine the owners would prefer that the fans don’t know that. But, I admit that is speculation.

But again, I agree that is the job of Joe Douglas (and probably others in the front office) to convince Woody to spend the money on insurance if at all possible (it may just not be on the table with Woody — we don’t know that). I mean, again, given the rule as it stands, there is no reason why ANY GM would not love to have his owner take out insurance on ANY contract (I mean, it’s someone else’s money to buy cap space — talk about making your job easier) … but I agree that it’s possible that JD didn’t push hard enough for it in this case (we don’t know if it’s even an option with Woody and we don’t know how hard JD pushed, but it’s possible he shares some of the blame). So I don’t take issue with questioning whether JD is at fault too (and, again, I did reference “the Jets and Woody” through my post). I do take issue with the condescending snark in your reply.

[batman10023]

1 hour ago, JoeNamathsFurCoat said:

did you have fun in Nashville?

too much fun.

was paying for it all day monday/tuesday morning.

you?

[batman10023]

8 minutes ago, Gaffneycatch81 said:

I agree with the bolded — which is why, until the last sentence of my original post, I said “the Jets and Woody” when referring to failure to take out insurance.

I don’t agree that there is any reason to question that every owner in the NFL is aware of this option. Several font office sources or former GMs, including Idzik, say it was routinely discussed. And it was part of the Rodgers contract they inherited. And the article states the Jets got phone calls from insurance brokers trying to sell them a policy on Rodgers. So, the idea that a high level decision maker — particularly a guy who has owned the team for over 20 years — is not fully aware of the option and it’s implications is very far-fetched to me. The secrecy around it is more likely that they prefer to keep it quiet due to fan reaction if they don’t have a contract insured — conceivably, an owner who doesn’t mind spending his own money to win could insure every player on the roster, and recoup cap dollars every year if he wanted to in the interest of winning, and I’d imagine the owners would prefer that the fans don’t know that. But, I admit that is speculation.

But again, I agree that is the job of Joe Douglas (and probably others in the front office) to convince Woody to spend the money on insurance if at all possible (it may just not be on the table with Woody — we don’t know that). So I don’t take issue with questioning whether JD is at fault too (and, again, I did reference “the Jets and Woody”). I do take issue with the condescending snark in your reply.

it would make sense for very competitive owners (and wealthy) to use this loophole to get larger cap than others.

Maybe it could add $20MM to the cap (insurance proceeds) - that's enough for a pretty good player to add to the roster.

obviously the owner has to be very wealthy for this to be done consistently.   maybe just do it when you have super bowl aspirations?  essentially the owner gets to pay cash to increase the cap.  

[Lupz27]

3 hours ago, Warfish said:

I love the presumption that it was the Owner being cheap, not the GM failing to plan for an injury to the old QB. 

Owners don't personally handle insurance for players, or management of the cap, that's the GM's job.

Lets be honest, anything good "yay GM!", anything bad "Boo, Owner sucks!" tends to be the mantra here at JN.

Same as last year the "owner forced Rodgers on GM" talk, but if Rodgers is great this year it'll be "GM is so brilliant for getting Rodgers despite the Owners objections", lol.

Who hires the GM?

[Gaffneycatch81]

9 minutes ago, batman10023 said:

it would make sense for very competitive owners (and wealthy) to use this loophole to get larger cap than others.

Maybe it could add $20MM to the cap (insurance proceeds) - that's enough for a pretty good player to add to the roster.

obviously the owner has to be very wealthy for this to be done consistently.   maybe just do it when you have super bowl aspirations?  essentially the owner gets to pay cash to increase the cap.  

Yup!

[Gaffneycatch81]

19 minutes ago, batman10023 said:

it would make sense for very competitive owners (and wealthy) to use this loophole to get larger cap than others.

Maybe it could add $20MM to the cap (insurance proceeds) - that's enough for a pretty good player to add to the roster.

obviously the owner has to be very wealthy for this to be done consistently.   maybe just do it when you have super bowl aspirations?  essentially the owner gets to pay cash to increase the cap.  

So, some owners run their teams like a business, trying to maximize profits by cutting costs. The Bengals are notoriously cheap, for example. And some owners seem to run their teams purely as an ego hobby, and are willing to spend big for a championship even if it doesn’t benefit the bottom line in a meaningful way. The Niners used to be known for this (not sure of their current ownership situation), as well as others. My issue with Woody is he seems to be kind of schitzophrenic when it comes to how he runs the team — sometimes he gets a bee in his bonnet and wants to go all in no matter the cost, other times he seems to get cheap around the edges. I guess there are worse things, and it’s his right to spend or not spend for whatever reason. But it seems to be based on whim, and which way the wind is blowing … and I just don’t think that inconsistency serves the organization very well.

[FidelioJet]

37 minutes ago, batman10023 said:

it would make sense for very competitive owners (and wealthy) to use this loophole to get larger cap than others.

Maybe it could add $20MM to the cap (insurance proceeds) - that's enough for a pretty good player to add to the roster.

obviously the owner has to be very wealthy for this to be done consistently.   maybe just do it when you have super bowl aspirations?  essentially the owner gets to pay cash to increase the cap.  

Exactly.  Adding $20mm in cap space is a serious competitive advantage.

All of these owners are wealthy and all of the teams are immensely profitable.  Just comes down to which organizations want to maximize their chances to win and those that want to maximize profits.

Apparently the Jets are the latter.  

[Warfish]

49 minutes ago, Gaffneycatch81 said:

I do take issue with the condescending snark in your reply.

Any snark in my original reply was not aimed at you personally, but the community in general. 

And more directly in response to the 2nd post in the thread, "I, for one, am shocked that Woody is a shortsighted oaf." than your post, which is why I didn't quote your OP.

If we're taking issue with things, I take issue with your direct reply to me that I "didn't read the article" when it's clear the article didn;t name a responsible individual, and people were, in fact, assuming/presuming it was Woody.

So...yeah.  /shrug.  We can keep taking issue with each other on rhetorical stylistic grounds, or (as it seems we do) mostly agree on the topic.

 

[Gaffneycatch81]

13 minutes ago, FidelioJet said:

Exactly.  Adding $20mm in cap space is a serious competitive advantage.

All of these owners are wealthy and all of the team are immensely profitable.  Just comes down to which organizations want to maximize their chances to win and those that want to maximize profits.

Apparently the Jets are the latter.  

You can bet the owners hate this rule, because it’s basically a way to filter extra money to the players. The owners use their money to pay insurance premiums that don’t count against the cap, and when those policies get paid out it goes into the cap and paid to players. It was collectively bargained and the owners probably gave in to the players association on it for other concessions. And they probably informally agreed amongst themselves not to use it much, if at all. 

Under this rule, an owner who doesn’t care about costs could, conceivably, insure his whole team. Based on the numbers in the article, that might cost (very roughly here just for the sake of the example) $100M. The payouts will vary year to year and over time won’t average out to 100% of what is paid (insurance is a business, after all) — but let’s say on average they get 60% of that back over time. That’s a HUGE competitive advantage. Obviously, no owner is willing to do that (again, I’d be willing to bet they have agreed not to do that) … but it’s a major loophole in the cap. And I’d guess it’s not something they want the fans — who they want to think the teams are all about winning — to understand.

[Warfish]

29 minutes ago, Lupz27 said:

Who hires the GM?

The Owner, and he is 100% responsible for that.

Be assured, my posts here are not a stealth "Woody is a good owner" claim.  He isn't.  He'd made an endless list of bad decisions and bad hires in his tenure.  

[Sperm Edwards]

1 hour ago, Warfish said:

I would argue that Woody is not the hands-on, day-to-day, force-things-on-his-GM-his-GM-doesn't-want manager than many on this site claim he is.  As I joked, the community here generally goes full-bore "Woody is a meddler, responsible for all decisions" when things go wrong, and give credit to the GM for any and all decisions when things go right.  

In this case, the decisions to trade for a player rest primarily with the GM.  Knowledge of a players injury history, and likelihood of injury, rests primarily with the GM.  Knowledge of this cap management loophole (which the article implies not everyone in the league was fully aware of and some teams kept somewhat secret) is primarily the responsibility of the GM.  Suggesting to Ownership things to defray perceived on-field cap-based risk is primarily the responsibility of the GM.  Ownership may need to buy in, but the GM has to make a good business-case for these decisions.

Also, the argument that Woody willingly traded for a 100+ million in payroll liability but decided to cheap out on a vastly less expensive insurance policy seems illogical to me.  The trade was the big cost, not the insurance.  Similarly, I've read people here say that the Jets decision to not adequately back up Rodgers last year was also on Woody, not the GM, which also seems a bit silly to me.  What I think is far more logical is a GM who saw formerly iron-man Rodgers as a very low injury risk, and made decisions presuming he would stay healthy, both insurance wise and backup QB wise.

Ultimately, whomever decided decided wrong.  If it's Woody, boo Woody.  If it's the man most responsible for all cap-management and player-personnel decisions, the GM Joe Douglas, then boo Joe.  I just don't agree, in this case, that it's as logic-based to presume meddling cheap Woody instead of the GM.  But as you note, us outside the building likely will never know.

I generally agree with this re: the meddling stuff. I'm sure from time to time he puts his thumb on the scale, as I suspect almost all owners do as well -- it's their multi-billion dollar property. But it's overblown and repeated GMs have said he lets them do what they want (and is why they get fired for poor performance; otherwise he'd know it's always his own fault). 

In this one area for insurance it seems nothing gets done without Woody OK'ing it (at least if the article is accurate). 

In truth, a GM would have almost no incentive to decline to insure a big-money player. For the GM it's all upside, no downside.