I confess that I didn’t really pay attention to the Melbourne Storm storm that blew in last week—apart from being happy that Geelong’s rival St Kilda could be implicated (apparently, the chap who rorted for the Storm previously worked in the same position for St Kilda); wondering about the sense of these stupid salary caps; and expecting the Worriers to be whipped when they met the Storm at Terror Dome over the weekend.
Point number three was pulled off in style—turns out the Worriers can’t even beat a team who isn’t allowed to play for points, being 22-0 down by the half.
Point number one was rubbed in when St Kilda lost over the weekend to the team Geelong beat the week before by over ninety points.
And point number two, about salary caps, was answered for me by Stephen King, who argues that the effect of salary caps is to raise profits for the league at the expense of the earnings of the players, who “are paid less than the value that they would command in a competitive market.”
“The AFL and the NRL are selling an entertainment product called football. They produce this product by having a number of licensed clubs who play matches against each other. In order to maximise the profit from the sales of their product (direct to fans, via merchandise and via television rights) they try and evoke an emotional response from their customers, hoping to align customers with a particular club (or sub-brand). In order to maximise their sales and profit they want to keep the competition ‘even.’ To do this they place various rules on the clubs to ensure that no one club can get too far ahead of the others or fall too far behind… And to minimize costs and maximise profits, they use their monopsony power over their main employees – the players – to ensure that they are paid less than the value that they would command in a competitive market.”
That hardly seems fair, does it. Restricting players’ earnings so the league itself can reap rents.
“Sydney Swans coach Paul Roos seriously doubts that Greg Inglis or Billy Slater could switch to AFL - but believes new club Greater Western Sydney will target the pair anyway.
“Because the Melbourne Storm is likely to shed players to comply with the NRL salary cap, both Slater and Inglis have been touted by several leading AFL figures as prime candidates to join Karmichael Hunt in switching codes.
“But Roos was not convinced the ploy would succeed…”
6 comments:
To be fair, the whole show is entertainment. That includes the soap operas that accompany the games (doesn't matter which code) off the field. So sit back, relax and enjoy the show. It's all put on for you!
LGM
I guess as long as the salary caps are agreed to by all clubs, no-one should have a problem with it.
Unrestricted wages for players leads to the mess we see in the UK with most soccer clubs, even the giants like Liverpool and Man Utd, almost insolvent, and some clubs, even in the Premiership, going into supervision.
Salary caps have their pluses and minuses.
Last week Portsmouth in the UK EPL went under woth more than $200milliion owing. Players are gonna lose there too.
Salary Caps are mean't to protects clubs and overall the league by ensuring that clubs are not put into financial difficulty by overspending on players which si very easy to do when there are no caps.
I don't like either situation but I guess I prefer caps as opposed to clubs going under and their players face a nervous wait and if no buyer is found then they will have to find new clubs.
Lesser of two evils.
Barry
Caps don't ever work. In this case the breached cap is a convenience to jettison an unsellable liability which has lost over Au$6-million over the past few years. The cap has done nothing to stop loss.
LGM
There are 15 other clubs in the competition. None of those are in receivership.
Storm was a new club. Specifically a gamble to break into the Melbourne AFL stronghold.
The losses have nothing to do with excessive salary spending and more to do with set up costs and sponsorships for a new franchise.
Without salary Caps more clubs may be folding.
Compare the number of European football clubs that have folded in the last 20 years to NFL clubs. No argument that Caps have contributed to greater stability in the NRL and therefore have their benefit.
Barry
Strictly speaking you are correct, none are in receivership. But the likes of Newcastle, Cronulla, Wests are often on the financial brink.
A large proportion of revenue used to come from the leagues clubs through gambling and hospitality. This has dried up in recent years (I think this revenue is now taxed).
Clubs have failed to generate new revenue streams to replace it.
Souths were in the same situation until Russell Crowe and mates bailed them out.
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