The Cowboys will end up paying Dak 4 yrs/ $240+ million with $200 million guaranteed next year. They may have gotten away with paying him $53 million prior to free agency but that is long gone now.
I remember when A-Rod getting 25 million a year was a big deal...now the Goff's of the world are getting more than double that...
I honestly surprised the NFL...and the players union hasn't made any move towards capping QB salaries. In a league with 1700 guys, like 15-20 players are soaking up 15% of the money. They are inarguably the most important players on the team, but it's crazy how much is going to them given the size of rosters. NBA superstars make a comparable amount of money with rosters 1/5 the size. This isn't like the MLB where there's is theoretically an infinite amount of money available, the NFL has the hardest of caps, that money is going to get spent.
This will seem crazy, but I can foresee a time where the QBs sub-contract the Offense and buy their own OL, WR, TE and RBs.
I look at it like, You want ME to pay$500/mo in fees to watch an ever growing number of profit centers as well as taxes for facilities so Billionaire Owners and almost billionaire players can act like children while making less than 10 seconds worth of your salary each month. Something is way off balance. Go Texans. (yes, I'm a hypocrite to be appalled at the extortion of taxpayers and still root for the team.)
Just go full Socialist and demand fair (equal) pay for every player, regardless of effort or production. $255M divided by 51 equals $5M per player. NO DEVIATIONS!
Eventually there will be dissent within the union. QBs getting paid this much, albeit deservingly, will cut into other positions. This will mainly effect the lower tier players and positions. Like you said, this is not the NBA...there are too many mouths to feed and a hard cap. The Union will probably fight to increase the cap (thus making us fans pay more to consume the product), get rid of the hard cap, or there will be hard caps on how much percentage a player's salary takes from the salary cap. Either way, fans will have to pay more to consume the product.
It's interesting. QBs make up a pretty small percentage of the player's union. I would imagine the NFL and owners probably don't care if the QB position is capped or not (owners would be in favor of capping, if anything). So if the player's union ever got to a point of deciding that's what they wanted to do, I imagine it would be a quick negotiation/amendment because the only real dissension that I could see would be within the player union itself. I'll be surprised if it happens. I think it will be more likely that you'll just see a natural adjustment of the market, kind of like what we've seen with RBs. But there likely won't be as much grousing from players about teams being unwilling to pay QBs because they already make so much compared to other positions.
The RB market adjustment wasn't natural though, it was a total sea change in the sport leading to the position being devalued in terms of winning games. That same sea change has made QBs more vital. Only way the QB market corrects is if the sport changes again and becomes less reliant on QBs, which seems extremely unlikely. QBs are much better stars of the league than any other position. League wouldn't want to adjust that.
I guess it depends on your definition of natural. The RB market changed without any changes to the CBA related to what running backs are paid. To me, that's a natural adjustment that was a result of owner's paying what they think RBs are worth. If QB salaries keep climbing like they are, eventually it will happen for them as well.
I see what you mean, but it's not natural in that it wasn't just teams getting smarter. The league changed the rules of the sport.
I don't see QB salaries changing naturally in that sense. Only way that happens is if the league changes the rules to stop limiting the defense, and with all the increase in safety concerns....I doubt that'll ever happen. It will take an unnatural rule to limit the QBs pay. The only position's salaries I can see naturally going back would be WRs that are also getting paid exorbitantly.
I want the players to get paid but dam, when I saw Goff get that contract, I was like WOW, something has to give. Goff has done well on the Lions but come on man, he is now the second highest behind Joe Cool............the disparity of what the QB is paid compared to everyone else is starting to become ridiculous, yes, it's the hardest position in any sport but every new signing seems like a new record. I think there needs to be a cap (% wise) or pretty soon you won't be able to field a decent team if that large of a % is going to one position.
Either that or make QB salaries not count or not fully count against the salary cap to appease the non-QBs and QBs both, though typically the NFL owners win in labor disputes with the player’s union
