Lakers getting swept?

[the_bird]

Here's my proposal, mostly cut-and-pasted from another forum:

I'm in favor of greatly simplifying the system - cutting Larry Coon's FAQ down to about twelve items.

* Hard cap - some figure between the current "cap" and the luxury tax threshold. What's the average team payroll? Somewhere around $55M? Make the hard cap a little bigger, maybe $60M-$65M. Also impose a salary minimum of $35M-$40M, so teams can't chintz out on putting together a competitive squad.

* Contracts limited to three years, except max contracts allowed to be four. I'd be in favor with the last year of a 3-year contract, and the last two years of a 4-year deal, only being partially guaranteed as well.

* Two max contracts allowed per team. Max contracts equal to ~25% of the hard cap. As with Who's proposal, no salary increases built into the contracts. Might define "max contracts" as a percentage of the cap rather than a specific dollar amount; a max player could then earn "raises" if the salary cap was increases. 25% might also be too high - maybe closer to 20%?

* Rookie contracts stay more-or-less the same - slotted based on draft position, with two guaranteed years. One team-option year, then free agency. Given that high school players are no longer draft-eligible, I'd be open to letting players become free agents one year sooner than currently.

* 2nd round picks - same basic structure as 1st rounders.

* All players are free agents after their third season.

* No more "MLE" and "LLE" exemptions; it's a hard cap.

* Veteran minimum salary structure similar to what is in place today (more $$ for older vets), but all vet-minimum contracts count the same towards the cap. A five-year vet on a minimum contract might earn $1M, while Shaq earns $2M; both count as $1M for hard-cap accounting purposes. Don't want to discourage teams from signing older veterans.

* Teams that are hard-capped out but have experienced major injuries are allowed to petition to sign additional players at the minimum, but the injured players must be removed from the roster for a period of time (maybe the remainder of the season).

* As with the current system, cap holds of ~$1M for every roster spot (up to 12) that's unfilled.

* 16 roster spots - encourage teams to develop some prospects in the D-League. 12 active players.

* All players eligible to play in the D-League, with the player's consent (let injured guys rehab in D-League, like MLB players going to AAA). Good for the rehabbing players, good for the D-League to get some "names" playing.

EDIT: I'd also be OK with a portion of the players' salaries going into a deferred comp plan. Might save the owners a little money up-front (depending on how things are accounted for), and quite honestly so many of these kids are just clueless how to handle their finances. Absolutely no reason Antoine Walker should be bankrupt. Deferred comp is a perfectly valid form of compensation for high-salary individuals.

 

[bob1852]

EDIT: I'd also be OK with a portion of the players' salaries going into a deferred comp plan. Might save the owners a little money up-front (depending on how things are accounted for), and quite honestly so many of these kids are just clueless how to handle their finances. Absolutely no reason Antoine Walker should be bankrupt. Deferred comp is a perfectly valid form of compensation for high-salary individuals.

Agreed, but then there's the other side of things. No reason the Arizona Diamnondbacks should still be paying Matt Williams and Randy Johnson out of their 2011 payrolls...

 

[the_bird]

Well, it'd be in a DC plan, in a trust. They'd make a contribution each year based on their salary obligations (in lieu of paying more money out directly as player salary), and the players would earn an income benefit from the trust sometime after they retired. The owners could even offload their risk onto an insurance company.