Nick's Collingwood Bulletin Board

a few weeks ago, gerard healy alluded to this whisper on the couch.

Sydney has been told it cannot trade any players into the club this year or next unless the club is prepared to bring about an instant end to the cost of living allowance.

The Swans are extremely unhappy with the AFL directive, which also prevents the club from recruiting any restricted or unrestricted free agents to the club before the end of 2017.

It means the club will only be able to replace a player who seeks a trade out of the club with a draft pick or picks.

Read more: http://www.theage.com.au/afl/afl-news/a ... z3FcqiUIda

i would like to see this extended to the premiers.

why wouldn't they just hit em under the 2016 salary cap

weird - must be some legal reasons behind this in that Swans will argue they can pay CherryCola to buddy for the term of his contract, so maybe they are stopping them signing any further long term deals

And why exactly? Last time I checked the Hawks don't get a COLA. According to you, excellent recruiting, coaching and administration apparently should see the Hawks extended the same apparent stipulations as a heavily salary cap and academy favored team in the Swans. That's just sour grapes John, don't stoop down there.

az, was being a tad facetious with my comments re hawks. sorry.

John Wren wrote:az, was being a tad facetious with my comments re hawks. sorry.

Apologies. Think I just joined the ranks of Dave in getting lost in translation on here.

John Wren wrote:az, was being a tad facetious with my comments re hawks. sorry.

Careful you'll upset the hawks no.1 fan on this board

Fantastic, about time! Not sure about the timing of it all but cant stop LMFAO.

By the way I do think we should adopt a similar rule to the NFL where the top 4 teams cant trade in free agents the following year. That stops free agents from lining up to go to the best clubs which is what the FA process is now delivering in the AFL.

Putting aside all the hysteria about whether they deserve it or not etc etc, it actually makes a lot of sense.

The key thing most people miss because of the sensationalist headline is that the Swans aren't banned from trading in players. They will simply lose their COLA payments immediately rather than have them phased out. By all means, if they want to trade in players they can do so, just don't expect the COLA payments to stay.

They've argued that COLA needs to be phased out over a number of years because their salary cap is already full and they had planned to have COLA. Therefore the AFL have allowed them to phase it out over a couple of years so that they aren't forced to trade out players they didn't want to. However, if they trade in players now, it flies in the face of having that phase out period. Technically they should be using any free salary cap space they get from trading out players to factor in the COLA payments rather than use that to attract another player.

Effectively, COLA is supposed to be abolished now as it provides an unfair advantage now (ie Swans are already have too much money to pay their players). The phase out period is just to assist them to plan their salary cap as it would be unfair to force out players that they legitimately signed contracts for based on the rules around COLA at the time. But bringing in a new player now without factoring in existing COLA into the salary cap will be effectively taking advantage of their extra salary cap for another couple of years and flies in the face of having a phase out period.

They either should have the COLA or not. But as usual AFL have taken the "make up the rules as we go" approach.

How can the AFL all of a sudden say they can't trade players in?

melliot wrote:They either should have the COLA or not. But as usual AFL have taken the "make up the rules as we go" approach.

How can the AFL all of a sudden say they can't trade players in?

They haven't. That's the key thing people are missing. The AFL is essentially leaving the decision to Sydney. They can keep COLA if it's just used to retain players on existing contracts or they are allowed to trade in players in which case they will lose the COLA benefit.

They have not banned them from trading in players

melliot wrote:They either should have the COLA or not. But as usual AFL have taken the "make up the rules as we go" approach.

How can the AFL all of a sudden say they can't trade players in?

I agree. Don't like the COLA, should always have been an allowance administered by the AFL with an arbitrary cut off of say $250-300K, but but that's the rules set by the AFL and Swans have played within them (apparently). How can they then justify shifting the goal posts when someone is lining up for a set shot? 2x wrongs don't make a right...

Harvey wrote:

melliot wrote:They either should have the COLA or not. But as usual AFL have taken the "make up the rules as we go" approach.

How can the AFL all of a sudden say they can't trade players in?

They haven't. That's the key thing people are missing. The AFL is essentially leaving the decision to Sydney. They can keep COLA if it's just used to retain players on existing contracts or they are allowed to trade in players in which case they will lose the COLA benefit.

They have not banned them from trading in players

And all of a sudden they lose 10% of their salary cap while being contractually commited to providing COLA to all existing contracted players.... so yes, they could choose to trade, sadly that salary cap space they thought they had just evaporated, not because of mismanagement, but because they still have to pay most players at 110%.

jackcass wrote:

Harvey wrote:

melliot wrote:They either should have the COLA or not. But as usual AFL have taken the "make up the rules as we go" approach.

How can the AFL all of a sudden say they can't trade players in?

They haven't. That's the key thing people are missing. The AFL is essentially leaving the decision to Sydney. They can keep COLA if it's just used to retain players on existing contracts or they are allowed to trade in players in which case they will lose the COLA benefit.

They have not banned them from trading in players

And all of a sudden they lose 10% of their salary cap while being contractually commited to providing COLA to all existing contracted players.... so yes, they could choose to trade, sadly that salary cap space they thought they had just evaporated, not because of mismanagement, but because they still have to pay most players at 110%.

Which is the reason the AFL introduced the phase out period so that Swans don't have to trade out ~10% worth of players this year to fit within the cap.
But the principle remains that this year they still have a 10% advantage in terms of player value vs other lists.

If they trade out a player or a player like Malceski leaves, they should be using that new salary cap to manage putting the existing COLA payments within it as it will bring them in line with salary cap of other clubs. If they trade in a player to take advantage of that spare salary cap, it just flies in the face of having that whole phase out period anyway. This is the AFL's argument. Any spare salary cap they create now through player movements should be used for COLA. If they managed to shed more player salaries than COLA payments then sure of course they're allowed to trade in players.

jackcass wrote:

Harvey wrote:

melliot wrote:They either should have the COLA or not. But as usual AFL have taken the "make up the rules as we go" approach.

How can the AFL all of a sudden say they can't trade players in?

They haven't. That's the key thing people are missing. The AFL is essentially leaving the decision to Sydney. They can keep COLA if it's just used to retain players on existing contracts or they are allowed to trade in players in which case they will lose the COLA benefit.

They have not banned them from trading in players

And all of a sudden they lose 10% of their salary cap while being contractually commited to providing COLA to all existing contracted players.... so yes, they could choose to trade, sadly that salary cap space they thought they had just evaporated, not because of mismanagement, but because they still have to pay most players at 110%.

But Jack, there's a no dickheads policy up there at Sydney. All their players will understand that they just need to take a 10% pay cut for the sake of the club. They'll be happy to do it!

Buddy Franklin, being such a selfless bloke, will probably offer to give up 30% of his contract so the Swans can can use the extra cash to go and sign someone else who's not a dickhead either.

This seems like a total re-run of the "tanking" saga: the AFL institutes an unfair rule that everyone can see is unfair, and then, once the worst consequences come to pass (in this case, one team has an unfair advantage over the rest), the AFL "punish" the club as if it was somehow their fault.

I know it's easy to point the finger in hindsight, but what did they think would happen?