Talk:Salary cap

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Earlier salary caps
This article is a bit American-centric: the Australian Football League had a salary cap in 1984, well before the timeframe this article is discussing. I don't want to edit this article straight away in case I'm just being Australian-centric, there may be instances of salary caps being used before then. Anyone know of any? Shane King 07:19, Nov 1, 2004 (UTC)


 * The early history of professional sports (19th century - 1930s) in North America was replete with salary caps, tacit in most cases, open in a few. Mostly they were the result of tacit agreements amoung owners and the resultant "peer pressure".  Once the reserve clause became a common feature, they were essentially unnecessary until it was overturned, because each player was essentially held hostage by it to his current team, and salary caps were then unnecessary until it was overturned, in the U.S. at least by a combination of collective bargaining and legal action.  What I would like to know is if there were similar arrangements in professional sports elsewhere?  Can you answer this?


 * (Of course the article is only North-American-centric due to ignorance of the authors, or at least of this one, of the practices outside of North America, and not any lack of interest or ineherent bias.)


 * Rlquall 17:10, 1 Nov 2004 (UTC)

QUESTIONS
HOW MANY PLAYERS ARE ON A TEAM AND HOW IS THE SALARY CAP DIVIDED??? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 161.57.206.132 (talk • contribs) 18:30, 30 November 2004 (UTC)
 * It is my understanding that the salary cap in the NBA applies to the twelve-man roster (this is the number of people who "dress out" for a game; apparently there are fifteen total players on a roster now to allow for injuries, etc., but in the last three there are few salary issues as all would be playing for the contractural minimum). How to divide the money among the players is somewhat up to managment except that the NBAfag ass white boycale" based on where in the draft a player is taken; obviously the earlier a player is selected, the more money he receives in his initial contract.  Also, collective bargaining between the Players' Association and the NBA has put a minimum salary that can be paid a player which increases based on his years of service in the league; obviously this has cut both ways as the marginal older player is left out if his talents are lesser or equal to that of a younger player for whom the minimum salary is much less.


 * In the NFL, the top 53 players (the entire regular season roster) are under the salary cap. (In the NFL, four of that 53 are declared inactive for the weekend on Friday and four more three hours before the game so that generally there are only 45 active, dressed out players on the sideline at game time.)  Again, as in the NBA, there are minimums based on years of service in the collective bargaining agreement between the Players' Association and the league, which causes the somewhat premature retirement of the medium and average older player.  The leauge mostly leaves it to management on how to divide the salary cap among its players; if a superstar player (i.e., Peyton Manning) gets a huge proportion of the cap he may eventually find himself without other championship-caliber teams surrounding him.  Of course, the biggest difference is that the NFL doesn't have the so-called "Larry Bird rule", which allows a team to exceed the cap if they are re-signing a player who has already been with the team (named for the Celtics superstar player who played for them throughout his career due to this rule).
 * Rlquall 14:45, 1 Dec 2004 (UTC)
 * Good summary. One addition: the NBA has an individual maximum salary as well, with a sliding scale depending on the years of service in the league.  The maximum a fourth-year player can get is something like $9 million (with 20% annual increases beyond that), while a 10-year veteran could earn something like $17M in his first year of a new contract (again with 20% annual increases after that). Funnyhat 03:26, 2 Jun 2005 (UTC)

Editorial
Great Info - To bad it turns into a preaching editoral. And in one of the answers below - just cause its not clear - Its the top 53 (I assume that number is correct - was what I was actually looking for) in terms of dollars earned that year. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 24.234.102.128 (talk • contribs) 07:28, 1 March 2006 (UTC)

POV?
This is a very thorough entry, but there are several passages that seem to be advocating in favor of the salary cap, rather than simply giving information about it. Even in the "criticisms" section, the overall tone seems to be in support of salary caps. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 71.12.193.184 (talk • contribs) 23:41, 17 June 2006 (UTC)

Player Salaries and Ticket Prices
I simply have to strenuously object to the following: "However, many fans acknowledge that the lack of a salary cap has caused skyrocketing player salaries and that these increased costs are eventually passed on to rising ticket prices." This is not only contestable, but, in my opinion, probably false. There is little evidence that increased player salaries lead to increased ticket prices, and it also runs completely counter to basic economic theory. One only needs to look at college football ticket prices to see very high prices to watch players who don't get paid at all. David Grabiner addresses this at, and also notes that in the first 15 years or so of free agency, player salaries skyrocketed exponentially, but ticket prices, adjusted for inflation, did not.

Also this was discussed at length in Andrew Zimbalist's Baseball and Billions. Zimbalist is also quoted here saying much the same:

“Yet if you ask the majority of fans they’ll say that ticket prices have gone up too rapidly and the main reason for that is that [player] salaries are exploding. It is false. Any rational owner sets his ticket prices according to the demand for the game. And if he is doing anything but that, then he is not maximizing his revenues.’’

A simple google search of "+ticket-prices +player-salaries" will reveal an astounding number of links to sports economists all saying the same thing.

Because a raise in player salaries does not affect the marginal cost to the team of selling an extra ticket, that raise will not have any effect on the price at which profit is maximized (when marginal revenue equals marginal cost). Because of this, the salaries of the ushers and vendors at the park would have more effect on ticket prices than the players. In layman's terms, if teams could bring in more money simply by raising ticket prices, that's exactly what they're going to do regardless of how much any of their players make. By using the word "acknowledge" the above quote suggests that the point made is generally accepted. It is at best strenuously contested, and, at worst, patent nonsense. It's generally peddled by team ownership to justify increased ticket prices and for use as a tool against players during contract negotiations.

I'm a wikipedia newbie so I don't know the proper procedure for an edit. But I really would like to see this dealt with. But I can and will if I need to, I just don't want to screw something up. --Voros 11:44, 18 August 2006 (UTC)

The Worst Word Ever
''The penalties for breaching AFL salary cap regulations can be severe. In 2002, Carlton was found to have systematically rorted the regulations over a period of some years. Resultingly, it was heavily fined and stripped of its top player picks in that year's national draft. Carlton is still recovering from these penalties.''

The worst word ever is without doubt, "Resultingly." Don't change it. People must see the most awful word in the history of the Universe. MrAngy 05:07, 18 September 2006 (UTC)

Link to Luxury Tax
I notice the article links to "Luxury tax" in the MLB section; however the term luxury tax actually appears earlier in the article under the NBA section (just above). Wouldn't it make more sense to link the first occurence rather than the 2nd? -PK9 00:49, 20 April 2007 (UTC)

NHL issue
There are little or no sources for any info on the NHL cap. The info on how a team can get rid of a player's salary is unsatisfactory (unsourced, and completely original research). There is no evidence that the listed ways of dumping salary are the only ways, and the statement that "it appears..." that another way would work is completely unacceptable. Unless someone can source a statement of how a team may dump salary, I don't think it should be re-added. As a point, I believe Alexander Mogilny was sent to the minors by New Jersey because they needed cap room for Elias who was coming off the injured reserve. This implies that a) an injured player bumps the cap (which I know is true - a team is allowed to increase their salaries by the injured player's salary - if they are spending 30 and a 3 million player is hurt at the start of a season, they can add up to 3 million dollar a year-worth of salary more than they previously had); and b) that sending Mogilny to the minors relieved the team of his salary towards the cap, which was not mentioned as a way to dump salary. TheHYPO (talk) 03:16, 30 December 2007 (UTC)

I do not see any discussion of a salary floor in the NHL section... 151.202.84.238 (talk) 18:48, 12 April 2008 (UTC)Taras

"There was little financial incentive for Ballard to spend money on star players to improve the quality of the on-ice product and attract fans, as all Maple Leafs games were sold out regardless of how poorly the team played." I have deleted this oft-repeated but nonetheless silly argument. Even if we ignore other revenue streams like ads, broadcasting and merchandising, where success is not limited by the size of your building, it should be obvious that successful NHL teams proceed to and through the post-season, where they may play as many as 16 additional home games, equivalent to a 40% bonus on the regular season. I'd call that an incentive. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 99.235.147.221 (talk) 05:48, 12 March 2010 (UTC)

Sports = Socialism? Stupid POV. (Criticisms of salary caps -> Restricting Free Markets)
"The libertarian view also *ignores the fact* that sports leagues are premised upon competition that is more tightly regulated (by the rules of the sport) than almost any other occupation. Sports leagues, especially in North America, are in a sense *socialistic in nature*."

Wow. That's a pretty lame way to end the article. Regarding "the libertarian view", it's arguable whether any two libertarians share the same view on anything. To assert that "the libertarian view ... ignores the fact" is probably not supportable regardless of evidence or reference. Perhaps this sentence would hold true if someone found a citation where the Libertarian Party argued that sports aren't tightly regulated along with a peer-reviewed study that they are, but I doubt any libertarian would claim that anything was not "tightly regulated." Furthermore, I'd disagree that quarterbacks are more regulated than, say, doctors, judges, or police officers. The sentence is pretty lame.

Second, to say that sports leagues are "socialistic in nature" is a pretty bad misunderstanding of socialism, capitalism, and markets in general. You could say that sports leagues are *cartels*, like OPEC, but not socialistic in nature. (In socialist theory, the owner+manager vs worker/player divide is pretty un-socialistic, as are the wide disparities in pay. In socialist practice, when did the NFL last stage a genocide or purge, a hallmark of modern socialist regimes?)  Anyway, sports leagues are cartel, not socialist fiefs. Nobody ever called the Saudi's communist for limiting oil production to increase prices.

That said, it's hard to argue that salary caps, which were decided *by* the free market, "restrict the free market," without at least discussing the antitrust exemptions of MLB, NFL, etc., but nobody is making this argument. (Recall, e.g., that this exemption is why Senator Arlen Specter--for better or for worse--got involved in the NFL Spygate scandal.) For example, perhaps the antitrust exemption prevents a second baseball association from competing, thus preventing the salary cap from being negotiated up to match the richer of the two leagues. Of course, nobody has really argued this, and what second leagues there are pay so little as to not affect the big leagues (does a $2 million Arena Football team really put pressure on NFL teams with $110 million dollar budgets to raise salaries?).

I'm sure we can do better than this... —Preceding unsigned comment added by 71.182.188.34 (talk) 03:15, 4 June 2008 (UTC)

There is still a lot of POV in this article that should be dealt with or cited
Regarding the TV element, it may or may not be fact that more income is from TV (in every league?) than from anything else (merch? attendance/concessions? affiliate deals?); but it is surely opinion that TV ratings are the only or primary concern for all leagues. If they maintain their TV deals and the stadium/arena is empty, I assure you that the league would take a look at their product. Your opinion is that TV is more important, but I would argue that there is no fact to show that it is the dominant factor for salary cap decisions. TheHYPO (talk) 03:24, 19 August 2008 (UTC)


 * In that case I would suggest that a note regarding citation is required rather than removal, otherwise this whole article will be decimated - as you said, there's a lot of POV here, mostly because we are second-guessing the behaviour of sporting leagues. The NFL or NRL or AFL etc are not likely to come out with bare facts and explain to us the reasoning for the implementation of the salary caps, because their negotiations with the TV networks are so secret. Inferences need to be taken from their behaviour and what they do tell us. What we need for a citation is an academic article, possibly in economics that details the changes in sporting revenues and collective behaviour of sporting teams to act in concert to maximise revenue.


 * I would posit that TV is far and away the most important revenue stream for elite sports, and that parity is important for that reason. The fact that salary caps arrived at the same time as TV networks started poaching sporting content from each other, although circumstantial and shouldnt be in the article, is an important indicator. It should be mentioned because it is the most important monetary reason to have a salary cap. If you think that there are other income streams greater than television that have any impact on salary cap decsisons you are welcome to write them into the article, but that's no reason to delete information talking about maximising television revenue. I think you'd struggle though, because if merchandising, attendance or affiliations were more than sidelines, there would be NO salary cap because parity would decrease these sales. A team of stars would increase merchandising and attendance, and back when those factors were the main revenue streams there was no salary cap. Elite sports have become bigger than the size of their stadium, and thats why salary caps are about making money, not decreasing it. It is more a matter of reasoning and logic than opinion. Can you think of ANY other reason to have a cap that would increase revenue for a team? Mdw0 (talk) 06:30, 19 August 2008 (UTC)


 * Just so you know how things work on wikipedia, concensus should be reached on issues brought up on the talk page which are disputed before reverting edits which are disputed.


 * And just so you know how things work on wikipedia, just because the league is "not likely" to offer their reasonings does not mean you are permitting to ignore wikipedia policy on citation and verifiability. I'm quite sure there have been articles and books written on the subject of sports business, player salaries, and salary cap issues, and they are the type of source that is legitimate for wikipedia. You may posit all you wish about what is the maximum revenue stream, but your positing is not a citable source, and since "I posit" is synonymous with "my opinion is", it's clearly not appropriate justification on wikipedia. The NHL Salary cap had NOTHING to do with TV network poaching, so that seems like it would be a problem with your logic. Either way, your logic is not wiki-relevant. It is not my job as an editor to add in my opinions that balance yours; it is my job to remove opinion-biased content with no proof.


 * To debate your logic (which has nothing to do with this article), non-parity might improve merchandising for the Red Wings or the Yankees, but it certainly doesn't help the Diamondbacks or the Blue Jackets sell jerseys or seats. The league is more than just the team that's kicking ass. "Back when TV wasn't the main stream of income" was also before a) most leagues expanded beyond their means, and b) the uncontrolled salary inflation of the past 20 years or so; both of which are major reasons for the non-parity in the first place. TV didn't matter much in 1960, but the NHL only had 6 teams... barely any room for disparity. Now there's 30 teams, with many in weak markets. And while one of the goals of increased parity might be to increase the Blue Jackets' TV exposure, I'm sure the team would equally be happy with some fan support in person, filling up their arena a bit more. You should also remember that whatever league you are talking about, it's not the only league with a salary cap. Just because, perhaps, the NFL, for example, might have TV as a major impetus for desiring parity doesn't mean that every league with a salary cap has TV as the impetus. PS: if you read the NHL section, you'll notice that the NHL had a salary cap in its early days (pre-30s). I'm sure that had nothing to do with TV.


 * However, you seem to be under the mistaken impression that you must be proven wrong for opinion to be removed from the article. This is not the case. Unless it can be cited, this kind of opinion doesn't belong in the article. I left a heck of a lot more opinion in that is less contravercial, precisely because I don't want to gut the article entirely.


 * But just to put you to rest, The Toronto Maple Leafs are arguably the most "popular" team in the NHL, and probably the most desirable broadcast. According to wikipedia, they have the highest average ticket revenue in the league at around $1.5 million per game, which at an average of about 75 bucks a ticket over the arenas 20,000 seats - we typically sell out. (That's ticket revenue, excluding merch bought by the fans who attend, concession revenue on food and drink, and other income). In May 2007, according to this article, Sportsnet (one of the Canadian national sports networks) signed an 8 year rights deal worth $700,000 a game. Thus, strictly on ticket sales, one of the most popular and widely watched NHL teams potentially earns double by attracting a full house than it does on TV rights. Note also that the article says that Leafs pay production costs (lowering their revenue).


 * In 2007, by this article, the leafs had $138m in revenues (#1 in the league). By the $1.5m per game in tickets number, that means that would be about $66m in ticket revenue, or roughly than half of their revenues coming from tickets (not including money spent by those fans at the arena). There are teams in the league who didn't even have revenues over $66m, including the New York Islanders and New Jersey Devils - large market teams. Increasing attendance could be a huge revenue boost. This breakdown for the Islanders by Forbes quotes that NYI has a "lucrative" cable deal of $15m per season. They have an average ticket price of $44 and a capacity of 16,297 according to that same page. That works out to over $700k for a sellout, and over $31m if they sold out a season (of course if they managed to get that popular, they could probably afford to increase seat prices even higher).


 * Note also that the first article says no other sports club in Canada gets anything close to that amount for TV rights - that the Vancouver Canucks (our 2nd largest market) is worth $300k a game for TV rights. They should just as easily be able to earn well over double or triple that with a full house of tickets, so I think that pretty much busts your claim that TV rights are the only/main thing teams care about, from a revenue standpoint. At least not in the NHL. I'm not saying it's not true of any league, but it's only one of the many revenue streams that leagues as a general case (not any specific league) care about. TheHYPO (talk) 10:30, 19 August 2008 (UTC)


 * You're a TOUCH hockey-centric here. I dont claim to be much of a hockey nut, but salary caps are applied worldwide, and by picking out the biggest market, most famous clubs as examples probably highlights that the NHL should negotiate better deals for its rights. I agree that the NHL has a particular interest in using a salary cap to try to prevent closures and movement of its clubs, given its history, but that doesnt apply everywhere. But you can consider your NHL examples as reasons why it isnt appropriate to say TV is the overwhelming income stream in ALL sports. You couldve just edited the article to make that point.


 * The point of the salary cap is to control the Red Wings and the Yankees in sport, because its they who benefit the most from non-parity, its them who can maximise their revenues at the expense of the league, and to be honest, its probably the continued economic dominance of the traditional NHL teams when they continue to fail on the ice and the chaotic shuffling of team locations and continued financial difficulties of smaller market teams that indicates salary caps dont work to reduce those economic problems of weaker teams when TV revenue ISN'T the main income stream. But again, thats me doing thought experiments. What I'm trying to show here is while I accept your point that TV income is not the 'overwhelming' indicator in every sport, it IS important to the NFL, AFL, NRL and Super League and others. I rewrote the contentious sections taking out the bit about TV income being the most important to say that the need for parity and competitive matches is important in TV deals, and that maximising TV deals requires parity - and then you reverted it! Is there really such a problem with stating that?


 * Your other comments regarding opinion etc is ackowledged, and I dont believe my opinion needs to be shown to be wrong to accept an edit, but you're not editing, you're straight-out reverting all the time, removing my edits completely. As I said, in an article like this with few sources, you're holding me up to a standard that the rest of the text can't support. I could remove probably 75% of this article for the same reasoning - including your edits - and no-one would be better off.


 * Mdw0 (talk) 01:39, 20 August 2008 (UTC)


 * I'm 100% hockey-centric. I make no bones about it. The difference is, I'm not proposing to make the article all-hockey. I'm simply pointing out that in ONE of the MANY sports leagues that institute a salary cap, your claim that it's all about TV rights is wrong. Therefore, your addition to the article that "It is always primarily about TV rights" is not true. Whether it's true for one league or several, there are leagues for which it is not true. Therefore, it should not be in the article, even if you think that "the NHL is not important, and most leagues do it for TV rights, so I'll still say that they do it for TV rights because most leagues do", that's called uncited opinion, and it's not what wikipedia allows. Similarly, I'm not going to add to the article that NO leagues do it for TV rights just because the NHL does. I don't know that and have no citation on it. Suffice it to say, the leagues do it to improve the product for the fans. Whether it is for fans that come to the stadium, or fans at home watching TV. And I personally don't believe that you can find a source that will say that there is a league in the world that put in a cap only for (or in general cares only about) TV viewers, and don't care about attendance. If you can find such a source, state it.


 * "The point of the salary cap is to control the Red Wings and the Yankees in sport" - I do believe that this may be ONE point of the salary cap. I do not believe it is the only reason, and either way, both of us are SPECULATING. We are not qualified to put our opinion of that being the only or major reason into the article without citation. That's how wikipedia works.


 * "competitive matches is important in TV deals, and that maximising TV deals requires parity" This is what you BELIEVE is fact. I'm reverting it because I don't believe it holds water without citation. It depends entirely on what TV deal you're talking about and what league. If New Yorkers love the Yankees, and the Yankees are kicking ass, and there's tens of millions of New Yorkers compared to hundreds of thousands of Columbus...ans..., or Kansas Cityans. It is more likely that the New York stations, richer from much higher viewership and thus much higher advertising rates, can and will offer more money to the NHL For the rights to Rangers games, or MLB for Yankee games if those teams are winning (and therefore more desirable for NYers to watch) than Kansas City or Columbus stations will if the Royals or Blue Jackets are competitive (ignoring the fact that New York teams have their own networks for the moment).


 * You have to have some sort of reasearch to make claims as to profit maximization. That's too technical a science to make claims about in wikipedia. If you could find an article that claims it, you'd be ok (though I'd still suggest something like profit maximization would be better handled with an "According to [author]," unless the article implys actual research.


 * Finally, I don't disagree that this article is very poorly cited. I went through a lot of it and I took out a lot of opinion I found. I also left in some mild opinion with a tags, and other opinion that I personally know to be true, but wouldn't blame others for putting a  tag on if they disputed it. And yes, if you wanted to you could easily wipe out uncited stuff and kill the article, but I content that most of what is left is not opinion-type facts that are disputable, but regulation facts that could easily be confirmed by (in the NHL, for example) looking at the CBA or league rules. That kind of fact I tend more to adding  than deleting, since I figure there is likely someone who knows the rules who would have seen it and deleted it by now if it were not in the rules. But yes, ideally if someone had the time to do it, it should be cited with a section/rule number. I 100% agree there. If there are things in the article you think are INACCURATE, it would be within your pervue to tag or delete them. And I wouldn't be right in reinstating them without adding a citation. But it's not something to do out of spite or revenge. It's out of best interest for the article. There are TONS of articles on sports papers or websites about salary caps. I'm sure if it's all about TV rights, at least one such article will say so. Why not just do a quick google.


 * Finally, I'd just like to add that it is not vandalism to delete uncited statements that are not proven true anywhere in the article. That is an editors job when it may mislead other readers with statements they don't believe are true, but I think you realized that with your overreaction correction. I would also like to simply point out that since the paragraph in question begins with "in theory", and that phrase is commonly alternate wording for "I think that it should be," without having to provide proof, because it's just in theory and real world doesn't have to always behave like that. When there is a theory, it should be cited to indicate it's someone knowledgable and researched's theory, not yours. TheHYPO (talk) 22:12, 29 August 2008 (UTC)


 * Edit: I'm just looking over your latest edits now, which is part of what I reverted, headings like "Why parity?" are not encyclopedic. They add to the feeling I got from your edits as if you were writing a news article or a non-fiction book on the subject, and not an encyclopedia article. As I said in my first issue with the new section, the whole concept of listing "benefits" is iffy. To claim something is a benefit, and that the benefit even comes from the salary cap, those are the kind of things that should be cited more than the simple regulations and descriptions of what a cap is and what certain leagues' cap rules are. I hope you see why that is, and why I focus mainly on that section in terms of citation.


 * I'm still having a hard time leaving it as it is with your latest edits. "Leagues need to ensure a degree of parity between teams so that games are exciting for the fans and not a foregone conclusion." There are a few opinions in that sentence. One that parity results in a a game that is a forgone conclusion (I would say that in many sports, no game is a "foregone conclusion". They are simply more likely to be won by the "better" team, but in such leagues like MLB and NHL, there are FREQUENTLY losses to worse teams - 3-game MLB series are commonly only 2-1 (if not better) for the "better" team.) And secondly, that fans, as a whole, are unexciting by blowouts. I believe both of these are "original research" or opinion that don't deserve the absolutes presented in that sentence. You also say "The leagues that have adopted salary caps generally do so because they believe..." You should never state what anyone "believes" in an encyclopedia unless you have a quotation. Even ff you had a news article who wrote "the league believes...", unless he was basing it on a statement from the league, I would still say it should be "In Tom Author's opinion, the league believes...". Besides which, you have now decided not only what "the leagues" believe, but also that ALL leagues believe this. I would wager without even reading what the belief is that it isn't global. At very least it should say "many leagues" or "generally leagues..."


 * Finally, you AGAIN say "especially to television networks where much of a league's income derives" when you just acknowledged that this isn't true of all leagues. How is a reader supposed to know that this means "but not the NHL". I also don't really honestly believe that MOST of a team's income in either NFL or MLB come from TV rights. It may be a lot of it, but what is "most"? NFL stadiums often have something like 60,000 tickets. That has to be millions of dollars just in tickets without any concessions. TV revenue may be substantial, but it is your uncited contention that MOST of the revenue comes from TV and I still don't believe it. Again, If you want to say "salary caps are there to increase TV contracts", that's a pretty strong opinion, and I don't believe it belongs in the article without any citation. TheHYPO (talk) 22:31, 29 August 2008 (UTC)

[reducing indent for self-reply]: I know I'm replying to my own very long explaination of my opinion, but a very simple explaination just hit me that I thought might be useful: While it's is absolutely true that this whole article SHOULD be cited, and would be infinitely better if it were, the difference between the "POV/OR" section in question (Benefits, "Why Parity?" etc.) and the rest of the article is in the question it answers. The strict question that "Adoption" answers is "Who uses a cap?" The sections on NHL, MLB, NFL, etc. answer "What is the [NHL/MLB/NFL...] Salary Cap, When did it come into existance, and How does it work?", The issue with those are that "Who, What, Where, When and How" are ''typically'l questions with definative answers - factual that can be proven. When did the NHL cap begin? Answer: [first season after new CBA] (check any news source). What is the cap limit in the NFL? Answer: The cap is [explaination of how the Cap is calculated] (check the NFL regulations).

But "Benefits of a Cap" is another phrase for "Why does a league impliment a Cap?", and "Why Parity?" explicitly has "Why" in the title. "Why" of this type basically imply an opinion. Why does a league impliment a cap? Unless the league actually explicitly says why they did it, it's merely a guess by you or a reporter talking about the cap. "Why" questions are much more subjective, and much harder to verify, and a such, a contentious "Why" section is probably more prone to be edited down if uncited, because there will be differing opinions on why a cap is good (whereas there are less likely to be various people with legitimate beliefs that the cap came into effect two different times, or that a cap is calculated one way or the other. And if there are such people, it's fairly conclusive to find a source that can answer those questions. All that said, If you contend anything in the NHL section, the proper course of action for me would be to dig up the CBA or news and cite the passage that verifys the information when adding it back. Similarly, if you believe that a Cap is implimented mainly to improve TV ratings, all you have to do is put it back with a citation, which you haven't yet done. TheHYPO (talk) 12:06, 30 August 2008 (UTC)


 * I agree with nearly all of the above regarding verifiability - and I think I made a decent shot at pulling back the absolutes, changing 'most' to 'much' etc. There are some articles that are by nature speculative and presentation of differing philosophical points of view allows explaination of debate. Encyclopedias are there to answer questions (I know, philosophical and opinion-risky) but 'Why' is as important and valid as the other questions, just less easy to define in the rigorous way Wikipedia demands, so until a good source comes up, it can be debated or edited or deleted, like we've both been doing. As you say there is a lot of journalistic text on salary caps, but not much on the reasons for their existance, and besides, news media in general and sports media in particular contains unverifiable all opinion. The search for the good article continues... Mdw0 (talk) 09:11, 1 September 2008 (UTC)


 * But what you don't seem to be getting is that wikipedia is not here to present YOUR speculations; even if an article is speculative. Big Bang is 90% speculation, but it isn't the speculation of editors. It's the speculation of scientists. Same with the less common Giant impact hypothesis. Even increadibly speculative subjects (in my opinion) like 9/11 conspiracy theories is dominantly cited. I would LOVE to answer the Why question here and in any article; but the point is that the answers must come from a verifiable source. Yahoo brings up 24 MILLION hits for "salary cap". I cannot imagine that there is not a news article that could be used to cite at least some of your claims if they were true. I'm sure there are probably books on sports economics if you felt like going to the library and checking. If you don't want to bother to even check the online sources, laziness is not an excuse for adding in personal opinions and saying "I hope a source shows up". If someone doesn't believe what you're saying, it is your obligation as an editor to provide a source; not the other editor's obligation to leave the information there and hope a source shows up. TheHYPO (talk) 14:22, 1 September 2008 (UTC)


 * Got me. I have a habit of putting stuff in that I'm fairly sure I can find a good source for, which then doesn't get cited until someone chips me for it. And you're right, it is just laziness. Rewrite if you must and curse me for causing you work. All I ask is that I get a couple of days to find a good source to back up something that makes a more interesting article. After that, delete away - in fact if you're having a hard time leaving anything in that you think shouldn't be there, do me a favoutr and get rid of it. If I really care about what I've written I'll chase up a source. Mdw0 (talk) 05:10, 2 September 2008 (UTC)


 * I don't personally delete stuff unless I feel it's a major POV issue that either, in my personal knowledge, either wrong, or likely to be wrong. When there is simply an issue of "I'm not sure" and I don't believe any other reader will read it and be confused or misled by it, I typically just tag it. I don't have a problem doing that in this instance (in fact, I tossed an OR tag on the top of the whole section since I don't think any of it is clearly provable as the reason for every salary cap in every league. As such, I think readers should look at it and note that perhaps this isn't factually the case all the time, and might just be a generalization (which I don't deny - much of what is in this section is OFTEN correct). I only took out very specific claims that bore no evidence. I welcome others to do the same to my writings, and I hope you find some sources. Have a good one. TheHYPO (talk) 09:00, 2 September 2008 (UTC)

2001 World Series
As a positive, only twice in the past 30 years has a team won the World Series with a $100 million plus payroll: the 2007 Red Sox and 2001 Yankees according to Joe Posnanski's December 2008 SI.com blog, which was addressed by Peter Gammons in a January 2009 espn.com article. Last I checked, the Yankees lost that World Series to the Arizona Diamondbacks. Perplexed 17:57, 26 October 2009 (UTC) —Preceding unsigned comment added by Perplexed (talk • contribs)

I agree, and now that the 2009 series is over, this should be edited to say that it's two times, the Sox and the Yankees. 204.17.31.126 (talk) 14:34, 5 November 2009 (UTC)I don't have a username

CFL cap critism section
There is no source regarding these claims. I personally can't recall ever hearing or reading any comments like these made by members of the media or by players (current or former). --Takara soong (talk) 02:28, 8 April 2011 (UTC)

Luxury Tax Criticism Misleading
"A team with a $100 million plus payroll has won the World Series eight times (the 2009 Yankees, the 2004, 2007 and 2013 Red Sox, the 2011 St. Louis Cardinals, and the 2010, 2012 and 2014 San Francisco Giants); however, while $100 million plus payrolls have only existed since 2001, the last team to win the World Series with a payroll less than $100 million was the 2008 Philadelphia Phillies (payroll $98.26 million). However, this can be explained by the fact that the majority of elite players require high salaries when they hit free agency (unless team extends them beforehand)and teams with those players generally are going to perform better."

This portion is rather misleading since at this point in time the average salary for a team is $100 Million, stating that over the course of the last 13 years teams earning above the league average won the World Series about as often as teams earning below the league average is basically a more accurate summation of that statement. Which is to say it absolutely doesn't lend itself to any conclusion other than averages in sample sizes tend to appear about as you'd expect. It's not like there was a drastic shift over the years, it's been incremental and has hit every team at a similar rate and it's the league average has floated around the number for some time, it wasn't significantly lower as the section seems to imply, the cited 2008 Phillies team was 12th/30 every year since and 8 years in total they've been top 8 payroll with 7 of those being top 5 which should be a nice reminder of the misleading way in which baseball contracts are paid out. The average player salary has been trending up in a similar manner, as well as the salary floors being increased over that period. All of this is made worse by the fact that the section doesn't have a single source, the closest it comes is an an un-sourced allusion to a statement by the author of Moneyball. Here are a few sources that actually discuss and analyze the Luxury tax over the years in-case someone else has the time to rework, update and fix that section (I kinda don't), some of them are a little older: Good luck -- Karekwords?! 05:35, 15 December 2014 (UTC)
 * 1) 2005 paper on estimated potential impact of the Luxury Tax, revised 2007
 * 2) 2011 paper analyzing the impact of the Luxury Tax
 * 3) Here's a Wall Street Journal article with actual criticism of the Luxury Tax
 * 4) Here's an article from Philly.com discussing the Phillies concerns and effect the luxury tax had on their decisions when they had the second largest payroll in baseball
 * 5) Some more information on it from the same source
 * 6) Here's a list of postseason appearances and results since, well, postseason baseball started, for comparison purposes regarding the premise
 * 7) A Fangraphs discussion of the effects of luxury tax

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