Brian39
Registered User
- Apr 24, 2014
- 7,477
- 13,969
That would open things up to a ton of cap manipulation and completely demolish the core cap calculus that a player's cap hit is the average annual value of his contract.I really don't understand this rule. You should be able to extend your own players at any time.
In win-now mode and want that 30 year old star UFA that would 'normally' be worth $10M per year on a 7 year deal? Give him a 6 year deal worth $4M per year and then promptly sign him to a 4 year extension worth $15M a year. The player gets paid $14M more than that $10M x 7 year deal and everyone knows that he's going to be too hurt to extend his career for the last few years of that $15M hit. Push all the cap trouble down the road, get a stud for a huge bargain and then LTIR him in his mid-late 30s to avoid the cap hit.
That's an extreme example, but allowing early extensions would inevitably lead to every team in the league doing it (the same way restructuring contracts in the NFL has become the complete norm for getting cap compliant). You would very quickly have a league with every team shifting cap dollars year-to-year to fit massive payrolls under the cap.
Eliminating the restrictions on extensions would break the salary cap.
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