If owners can't achieve labor accord, value of teams will be impacted
COMMENTARY
By Jason Cole
NBCSports.com contributor
On back-to-back days in
Upshaw tossed the best volley when he related a comment from
Upshaw is right, but even he doesn’t know by how much. What NFL owners are toying with is not simply about turning their sport into the financial/competitive fiasco that is baseball, but many of them are toying with hundreds of millions in personal wealth that goes with the baseball model.
In short, if football doesn’t keep the salary cap alive and the level playing field together, the disparity between the value of top teams (at least financially) such as Washington and Dallas and lower-end teams like Cincinnati and Pittsburgh could be like the difference in value between the New York Yankees and Florida Marlins.
The NFL is in the middle of a financial boon. The Minnesota Vikings were bought for $600 million before this season by Zygi Wilf. Word is that the Saints will one day go to
A major part of that is the control the NFL has over labor cost, the ability to keep star players from changing teams quickly and the overall balance of the league.
“What’s really important is that every team on the NFL has the ability to compete on the field every year,”
If the NFL does get to an uncapped season in 2007, which is supposed to happen if an extension isn’t worked out by March 3,
Worse yet, some penurious owners, such as Bill Bidwill of
The long-term down effect is that franchise values will be impacted. The NFL can talk all it wants about how there’s always somebody who will want to own a team, but the specter of a team going from worth $600 million to $400 million over the next three or four years is going to be ugly.
Kraft tried to downplay that element, but he didn’t deny it.
“It doesn’t matter to me, I’m not selling. That’s a paper gain (or loss),” Kraft said when asked about franchise values being impacted. OK, but how will Kraft’s brethren feel about that? Over the past 10 years, eight teams have changed hands. Over the past 20, there have been 20 new owners in the league and franchise value helped drive the league.
Or as NFLPA president Troy Vincent said: “Those owners like to see where their teams are listed in Forbes (magazine) on those charts every year … If those guys see their teams go from $1 billion to $700 million in value.”
Vincent paused slightly for effect.
“That’s a lot of yachts,” Vincent said.
Again, the problem in this process is not about the players against the owners. While the difference between what the players want (61 percent) and what the owners are offering (58 percent) is significant over time (about $1.2 billion over a six-year period according to Vincent), that can be bridged.
It should be noted that on the Saturday after the gloom-and-doom statements by Tagliabue and Upshaw, those two were seen riding an elevator together with Kraft, all parties seemingly quite content.
The real issue remains among the owners and they are the ones who are toying with the biggest losses. If suddenly the 10 lowest-earning teams in the NFL lose $200 million or so in value and eventually the league’s TV contract is impacted down the line, the losses for the owners could be several billion over the same period of time.
In short, it’s time for there to be some cooperation among the guys who write the checks.
Jason Cole is a frequent contributor to NBCSports.com and covers the NFL for the
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