The NFL in an article released today will be raising the salary cap by $7 million from $113 million to $120 million for the upcoming 2012 season. All I can say is WOW! For a corporate entity that just last off-season tried to make the players look like greedy prisoners, desiring to run the asylum, a bump of this magnitude in the cap has me scratching my head a bit.

Let’s look at the reason for last years NFL lock out to see if we can discover a pattern of how the NFL propagandize their objectives. The owners want the general public to love the players enough to attend games, buy the jersey’s, which players do not revenue share in, purchase season tickets and tune into radio and TV broadcasts, which ups their ratings. This greatly increases the value of their product and generates greater marketing revenues for the league. The owners reason for the lockout was a claim that they were loosing revenues and couldn’t operate under the current CBA. They requested that the NFL Players give back a few Billion to help alleviate their financial stress. One thing I do know about negotiating is, you never go up, so you better start high because you always go down from the starting point. As players you cannot go backwards on ground gained, because every time the CBA is up the owners will try to take  back something they’ve given.

I’m not a CPA or financial wizard by any stretch, but today’s action to raise the cap is evidence that the owners will lie, beg, borrow and/or steal, to accomplish their goals. And if that includes throwing their greatest commodity (players) under the public bus of opinion, so be it.

Simple math always springs forth truth. The NFL salary cap is a direct reflection of how well the league is doing financially, because the player salary cap is based upon a percentage of total revenues (60-65%). This number however does not include NFL properties, which is the $3 Billion plus marketing arm of the NFL. So If the NFL was hurting financially last year as they claimed, common sense would direct me to study the salary cap. This is the one definitive financial line item that would tell the truth. There is no way that the NFL could possibly have lost revenue without it being reflected in the lowering of the salary cap, and yet they just increased it by $7 million dollars!

I am all for the players getting what they can, they deserve it every bit they get. If the owners couldn’t pay what they do, believe me, they wouldn’t. The truth always like cream, rises to the top. The players and public need to wake up to the lies of pro sports leagues and their owners. How can you possibly have a major presence in all broadcasting  mediums, which perfectly positions them for advertising and marketing revenues, sell product at the rate that they do, charge the ticket prices they do, and cry that they’re losing money? One thing big corporate businesses do not do, is lose money, and believe me pro sports are more about, and run like big businesses today than ever. 

Seth Joyner

Seth Joyner

The Peyton Manning road show has finally come to a close, with the Denver Broncos winning the Manning sweepstakes. 

Much conversation is swirling about why Peyton chose the Broncos? While the Broncos have some up and coming young WR’s, a good set of RB’s in Moreno and McGehee, he will not have the horses he had in Indy. Other factors to consider is money, at $19 million per season I would say, money was a major factor. Another factor is protection, the Broncos offensive line played extremely well last year, opening holes for Willis McGehee and protecting the indecisive Tim Tebow. Other intangibles, Pat Bowlen and John Elway, Bowlen has always been an owner committed to winning and putting a winning product on the field. Elway the teams most celebrated player and Hall of Famer is doing all he can to restore this Bronco franchise to glory.

I would say that the deciding factor had to be protection. No matter how good a QB is, no matter who he is, without protection he can become an average QB real quick. Throw in the fact that Manning is one good hit away from being on IR again and retired for sure, the stellar play of the Bronco O-Line had to be the deciding factor here. One things for sure, with this addition the Broncos just became the AFC West #1  contender, and possibly the AFC’s Super Bowl favorite if Peyton can get back to 2/3 of what he was.

Seth Joyner

I am a bit perplexed with all of the commotion over the NFL’s investigation into bounties on the part of the New Orleans Saints. If the league thought that this was something new, they’ve been asleep at the wheel. I watched a debate between former player on ESPN yesterday, the focus was on intent, from a defensive players perspective the intent has always been to take the opponents head off bounty or not and a few dead Presidents was never the motivating factor but the reward. 

It is particularly intriguing how opinions range between offensive and defensive player, players in the media who are trying to be politically correct and the ones who are just football purest. If I was an offensive player I would be outraged, being that I wasn’t though, allow me to interject my thoughts here. 

Football is and always has been a physical game, that being said, whether a bounty was offered or not players have always competed. Defenses have always been at a disadvantage, offenses know  where they’re going, yet defenses have to read and react. The big hit has always  been the field leveler, intimidation has been major factor in the game of football. How does a defense gain the upper hand by punishing offensive players whenever the opportunity presents itself. I do not agree with or condone dirty play, but the game that I knew and many of the ex-players that now have a platform to speak from knew was a vicious game. If I had an opportunity to hit someone so hard that I may hurt them “Hell Yes” I wanted that hit, because it sent a message, that if you came my way there was a price to pay, that is football, it also was a tone setter for the game.

The league has done all it could to lessen the ferocity of the  game by protecting offensive player, particularly the QB’s and WR’s, the game is set up for offenses to blow up scoreboards. But the NFL is two-faced in their approach. They create big hit DVD’s every year and sell them for profit, but they fine some of the same players on those reels for some of those same hits. Teams around the league offer incentive money, for tackles, sacks, interceptions and TD’s, in reality what is a bounty, nothing more than incentive money for big hits! Again, I firmly state I am  against intentional illegal hits to take a player out of a game, but a big hit is as much a part of the game of football as tackling and blocking. 

What is really at the core of all of this? As this unfolds in New Orleans the NFL will find itself dealing with it on just about each and every team. Sometimes it is managed solely by the players, other times the coaches will determine whether a hit is a big hit or not. It will never go away because the money doesn’t come from the organizations, the money comes from the pockets of the players. They understand that money is a motivating factor for some players, especially the young ones not making much of it, and that motivation can sometimes mean the difference between  wins and a losses. Let’s be honest here, everyone is looking for that something extra to give them an edge and if bounties help motivate some to play harder so be it.

From  what I have witnessed, money  relates to the game from the business aspect of it. Football is a much too demanding game to play purely for the money. Success never comes as a result of a player wanting to make more money, success comes as a result of a player loving the game and possessing the willingness to lay it all on the line to win and to become a champion.

Seth Joyner