Upshaw on Rookie Wage Scale

to me they should set up it up equal across the board.. 1st rounders are paid "blank" million dollars over "set" amount of years..  2nd rounders etc, 3rd etc..  obviously dont give me them chump change but say for 1st rounders 3 years and $5million per and give the team a 4th year option only..  make the whole contract guaranteed or whatever.. so up and down the whole round its the same price.. obviously than all teams take the same hit whether they move up spots or down etc..    just because you suck like Detroit they are trying and you cant continue to bend them over on top 10 pick money..  but still try and help them win!!    i do think that 7th rounders should also get guaranteed money.. obviously alot less but they did get "drafted"  so the team should be penalized for taking them..  but seriously  you just cant blame the team for picking a guy and than the guy turns out to be charles rogers or Mike Williams etc.. 

really if this was the REAL world.. and these were regular jobs.. these guys would be down at the unemployment offices ..  Brains and Ability to run are totally seperate things and should not be put together in the same conversation... now there are smart football players and of course they guys took college serious..  than there is the Mario Manninghams of the world..  i bet you he didnt even show up on test days..   yes i know careers are short.. well than you shouldnt have wanted to play football

this is a business and as commissioner i would want my teams all making a profit etc..  and you want parity with all teams being competitive..   what if JaMarcus and McFadden both turn out to be jack sh-t..   we are basically heavily screwed for another 5 years..  as a business owner you have to be able to say.. ok employee you just suck and you are done.. but these crazy salary demands are ridiculous..

"MY Biggest POINT is this.... if top 10 draft picks didn't go up, I think the vets would end up making less money.  Those top 10 rookie contracts go up every year and I think in turn they drive up the max contracts that the top NFL veteran players get because they "want to be the highest paid" at their position.  The escalating rookie salaries drive up the salary cap for all players to eventually cash in. "

Actually, the salary cap is derived from how much the owners make, not what rookie's are paid. If the owners are making X million dollars, then the salary cap is set at 60% of that. What the rookies make has nothing to do with it.

So, if the rookies are making less, then the owner has more to spend on veteran players, as it should be, because they are the ones who have paid their dues, literally and figuratively. In this current cycle, good-to-great players will always have ways found to get them on the field. It's the middle tier of players who get shut out. Take Rhodes, for instance. He may or may not get a salary worth a crap, despite teams having a much better idea of what they're going to get, and knowing whether or not he'll be able to deal with the pressures of the NFL, and the distractions of fame.

Neither can currently be said of the soon-to-be-obscenely-wealthy McFadden.

As I said before, there should be a cap for rookies, depending on where they are drafted. The flip side is that their contract has to be for three years, or less.

But there is also a salary floor.

As in baseball and basketball, rookie salaries don't drive veteran salaries. If McFadden made "only" $1 million dollars this year, salary and bonus, do you really think that veteran salaries wouldn't go up? The really big jumps are for the top players and the rookies, and, as I said, it's the established, middle-of-the-road players that get shafted.

That ain't how a union is supposed to work, but Upshaw's a tool.