2016 RULES: LTC

[Goodell]

This discussion won't impact LTC contracts now, but I'm hoping to clear up any lingering issues with that system -- especially if we add another LTC in the future http://www.fangm.com/sportstalk/viewtop ... f=7&t=1195

For the most part, I think LTCs are generating decent values. You'll get some steals based upon odd circumstances and some huge deals with teams willing to pay what it takes to keep a star they really want to keep. But there may be a couple more tweaks to look at to avoid the odd cases that fall through the cracks.

A couple possibilities there that should be easy to incorporate might be:

- Instead of getting an average of the top 10 salaries at a player's position (with similar grade up to +2 higher) as it does now, perhaps getting just the TOP 5 salaries instead to not have the lower figures drag the total averaged value way down.

- Perhaps keep it the same but add a FLOOR where certain situations couldn't go below a certain amount. A simple floor might be any QB with a starter grade had to at least get an averaged LTC salary of at least 50% of a transition tag value for that position ($8M this year). It could be more based upon comparing contracts, but couldn't be lower than that floor based upon half a transition tag. We could limit that to just QBs since they are the most important position arguably and some of the more questionable LTCs involved QBs with grade drops this year giving them very cheap LTCs. Or we could apply it to all position with a B or higher grade (80+) where QBs would be 8M, RBs 4.5M, WRs 5M, TE 3.5M, OL 5.5M, DE/LB/CB 5-6M as bare minimum floors for LTCs involving starter grade positions getting long-term contract extension options where the LTC might be more based upon league contracts but wouldn't be less than the floor.

- Perhaps an overall floor for players of any grade to avoid odd cases of players with no grade (like those coming out of retirement or newly signed to the NFL from Canada or whatever before getting a grade) of 25% of transition tag -- QB 4M, RB 2M, WR 2.5M, TE 1.5M, OL 3M, DE/LB/CB 2.5M as the absolute lowest LTC possible for a player of any grade. That if a player was worth being considered for long-term contract by his franchise that he'd be worth at least a quarter of what a transition tag player at that position gets.

Currently our floor would just be the veteran minimum and all LTCs just based upon comparable contracts.

Or other suggestions. Like I said, these won't impact LTC signings this off-season at all. This is just food for thought as I look at cleaning things up for best results going forward.

[jerrydlux]

Would this still have the "top 5/10 or 120% whichever is greater"? Or would it be just the top 5/10?

[Jared A]

My vote on this would drastically be affected by whether or not we add a 2nd LTC or not.

[Royce R]

I don't see why it needs to be any higher for the players on my team that need LTC'd it doesn't look like any super deals to me.

[Onyxgem]

I don't see why it needs to be any higher for the players on my team that need LTC'd it doesn't look like any super deals to me.

Agree LTC are right now as high or in some cases higher than franchise tags and that is more than high enough.

[Goodell]

Would this still have the "top 5/10 or 120% whichever is greater"? Or would it be just the top 5/10?

Yes, any option would include a 120% if greater. LTCs won't be a forced pay cut without the player able to see if other teams willing to pay him more before he agrees to a long-term reduction in salary.

Some leagues have had complaints about LTC values such as Kaepernick signing a 5-year deal at 3.6M per year where he makes 12-20M per year annually in reality in a recently signed deal. Stafford also for 5.7M per year long-term. That was the first one signed this year and I thought an error with the system initially. Beyond QB, Joe Haden 5.5M where he'll make 10M+ most years ahead in NFL.

Mostly this would be to put in some reasonable minimum floor to avoid any odd LTC circumstances in the calculation that generated off-the-wall low-ball unreasonable or unintended results. Kaepernick agreed to sign a long-term deal with SF instead of testing free agency, but he wouldn't do that for 3.6M per year offer as can happen here sometimes. This would just be more insurance to avoid LTCs that are unfairly unreasonably low to some teams and that LTCs at least for starters were somewhat capped at reasonable levels for fairer offers across the board and no teams getting low-ball opportunities where others don't.

It's okay to me if a team gets a great discount deal in free agency, because all teams had the chance to bid fairly. Not as okay to me if an LTC calculation from the league gives just some teams super discounts. The intention with LTC is reasonable deals that a player would really sign long-term, so capping it to avoid the odd low-ball offers would close a hole there and make all more fair to me.

[tino38]

I think somehow the signing bonus/guaranteed part of our contracts needs to be added to this. For example Brady, Rodgers, and Manning could hit free agency and draw a contract of 100Million signing bonus and 1 million salary and completely affect everything that the LTC is trying to do. More and more teams are starting to throw crazy big signing bonus to sign or retain a player. Their huge contracts would no longer factor into the LTC and teams would be getting better players at a significant discount.

[Goodell]

I think somehow the signing bonus/guaranteed part of our contracts needs to be added to this. For example Brady, Rodgers, and Manning could hit free agency and draw a contract of 100Million signing bonus and 1 million salary and completely affect everything that the LTC is trying to do. More and more teams are starting to throw crazy big signing bonus to sign or retain a player. Their huge contracts would no longer factor into the LTC and teams would be getting better players at a significant discount.

It's something to look at but mixing in signing bonuses have their complications too. We have a ton of trades here, so huge signing bonuses can disappear instantly. Everything the league does in terms of contract generation prioritizes keeping salaries at actual value levels, but I know that's not always how it goes in free agency.

We could say the "salary" it considers for LTC is salary + RB + SB/yr for the actual amount a player goes against the cap and use that for all the averages generated. It certainly would raise the LTC values doing that. We'd have to figure out how all that worked with our contracts generated that also have signing bonuses as additional costs differently than the averages generated where that was included. There'd also be lots of cases with trades where SB/yr made a huge difference for some but wasn't a factor at all for others because of trades and those SB/year disappearing and what impact that inconsistency had on generated values.

It adds some complications to things I think, but something to consider especially if SBs become more important than salary in market contracts more and more.

Those huge SBs in the market might be another reason why floors are needed to prevent odd league contracts resulting in unfair LTC contract numbers if there was a reasonable floor in place then it would prevent market factors creating LTC problems.

[Onyxgem]

I think somehow the signing bonus/guaranteed part of our contracts needs to be added to this. For example Brady, Rodgers, and Manning could hit free agency and draw a contract of 100Million signing bonus and 1 million salary and completely affect everything that the LTC is trying to do. More and more teams are starting to throw crazy big signing bonus to sign or retain a player. Their huge contracts would no longer factor into the LTC and teams would be getting better players at a significant discount.

Problem there is with LTC we add an extra SB onto them with more years and if we adding the SB of other contracts then the per year amount will go up a ton and then we still have to add a SB on top of it...so reality is that LTC will be accounted SB twice into their contracts instead of once like it should be.

[Goodell]

To me, really we just want to prevent bad LTC figures generated from the league. A floor of some type accomplishes that and keeps things simple for most calculations otherwise. Just stops the insanely low deals for long-term extensions due to whatever odd market contracts here.