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Editor’s note: This is part two of a series of articles written by Stephen Lucey. Part one, released earlier this week, focused on whether <a href="http://epltalk.com/can-a-salary-cap-save-the-premier-league-from-itself/16072" target="_blank">a salary cap could save the Premier League from itself</a>. Part two, here, discusses unrestricted free agency and compares the NFL model to the Premier League.
Portsmouth FC are near-mortally crippled by their wage bill, and are left to wander the Arabian deserts with their shower caps extended for oil soaked charity. The Premiership has been seduced by potential riches, and borrowed itself into a black hole filled with bank notes to pay down and creditors to to foil. UEFA’s report released yesterday attributes a 56% controlling majority share of European football’s debt to the Premier League. Obviously, competing in Europe is paramount for English football, but creating a sustainable economic model has to become as important a priority going forward.
Here I’ll acknowledge a concern from some of the previous commenters: Yes, the EPL and NFL are different entities with different structures, competitive factors and concerns, but they are also similar. The Premier League seceded from the Football League in 1992, establishing a corporation with each club holding a vote and equal stake in the partnership, and the NFL functions in much the same fashion. While opinions on revenue sharing in the NFL would vary owner to their contribution, it has been widely acknowledged as their best solution for a financially healthy league.

When the NFL introduced the hard salary cap in 1994, it did so on the back of unrestricted free agency, a policy adopted just a year prior in 1993. After a player had reached four years’ accrued service, he was free to sign with any team at the expiration of his contract. The speculation and anticipation of potential player moves bedded in nicely with the cable sports 24 hours a day news cycle, keeping loud, sometimes punch-drunk ex-players in paychecks, and ensuring interest in the league would only gather steam over the offseason.
An economic success for NFL franchises is the ability of a team to terminate a player’s contract at anytime, based on performance, age, health, or any other reason a millionaire might have to save some scratch. An NFL team can also claim one player with a “franchise” tag, compensating that player with one year’s salary averaged from the Top 5 paid at their position.
The transfer window system unnecessarily forces teams into long-term planning while the nature of sport is in immediacy and reaction. Restricting player movement only ends up restricting the potential quality of play, which is what we, as fans of great competition, should all care about. It is hard to say whose interests are greatly favored by this policy, which makes its skin tight oppression all the more confusing to a neophyte.
The hard cap created a new commodity in the NFL: cap space. Where transfers in the Premier League generally involve cash and credit transactions, NFL franchises value taking a player’s salary off the books when factoring out how older players’ contracts are dealt with. A lot of young NFL players will receive their biggest payday before they’ve entered the prime of their playing career. World football’s balance sheets are plagued with that one last payday for an aging, but perhaps outward star with a haul of credentials.

Is Unrestricted Free Agency a Model that Soccer Should Consider?

Is Unrestricted Free Agency a Model that Soccer Should Consider? - World Soccer Talk

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Major League Soccer is a niche league, perhaps the largest niche league in North America (depending on your view of hockey and the NHL).&nbsp; It lacks a lot of the tradition, and strength that can be found in older leagues such as the National Football League, or Major League Baseball.&nbsp; Even the NHL has strong traditions relative to Major League soccer.&nbsp; Niche leagues fill certain markets, and reach out to small support bases.&nbsp; They are not immune to problems and possess a wide variety of weaknesses.
One of those weaknesses is the susceptibility to a work stoppage.
Major League Soccer is on the verge of a virtual collapse, and the league seems to think that a collapse is preferable to granting the most basic right a worker has.&nbsp; The right of mobility and freedom to choose where you work.&nbsp; In any other line of employment outside of sports, the employer would be clearly in the wrong (and likely taken to court) for doing what it can to restrict labour rights.&nbsp; But in sports, we tolerate labour violations because there is a perception that we can encourage league competitiveness by restricting labour rights.&nbsp; Others rationalize the violation of labour rights as a way of keeping players from being paid too much.
Regardless, with any other product this would be considered illegal. But US (and Canadian) law is funny on sports leagues and the product they peddle. So, the Players are going to have to seek a compromise, as legal action on labour issues such as these has failed across numerous sports.
Major League Soccer is moving towards a lockout or strike, both of which would be absolutely terrible for the North American game and a blow to the credibility of the USSF abroad.&nbsp; There seems to be broad consensus among followers of the league that a strike or lockout would be the death of the league.
The odd thing about this whole situation is that MLS and the Players Union are not far apart on the issues. There remains a major stumbling block which has yet to be overcome.
It is free agency (in combination with player mobility).
Under the current system, players have no right to say no to a trade, and cannot catch on with another MLS team when their contract expires.&nbsp; And oddly, neither the league or the players seem to be able to come together on a compromise.
Here is what I propose as a solution.&nbsp; It’s a halfway point, known as Restricted Free Agency and is employed in the NHL.
1. Players over the age of 28 or who have played 5 years, consecutively, in MLS are entitled to unrestricted free agency. 
2. Players over the age of 28 or who have played 5 years, consecutively, in MLS are entitled to a No Trade Clause. 
3. Players under the age of 28 and who have not played 5 years, consecutively, in MLS are entitled to Restricted Free Agency.&nbsp; Clubs must offer a contract equal or greater in nominal value to their previous contract or the player becomes an unrestricted free agent. 
4. Players under the age of 28 and who have not played 5 years, consecutively, in MLS are permitted to negotiate No Trade Clauses into their contracts.
This is obviously not with all the bells and whistles that a “legalese” agreement would require, but it is something which the two groups can work off of.&nbsp; Maybe the age should be higher, maybe lower. Maybe you should need less or more consecutive years.
But it’s something of a compromise and may spark some ideas.
What do you think?&nbsp; What are your proposals on bridging this volatile issue? Would RFA work in MLS?

MLS Facing Unmitigated Disaster

MLS Facing Unmitigated Disaster - World Soccer Talk

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