The Ryen Russillo Podcast - LSU Head Coach Ed Orgeron, Plus Salary Cap Math Class | The Ryen Rusillo Podcast

Episode Date: March 17, 2020

Russillo is joined by the head coach of the national champion LSU Tigers, Ed Orgeron, to discuss how football operations are affected by COVID-19, revisit LSU's title run, talk about reloading for the 2020 season, and more (7:33). Then Russillo breaks down the salary cap for the NBA and NFL and how it all ties in with CBAs, TV deals, and more (18:35). Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

hey what's up i hope everybody is uh doing the best they can with everything that's going on the ryan russell podcast here part of the ringer network the plan for today coach oh ed ogeron lsu head coach national champion and the guy that I got to meet a bunch of years ago. So we'll ask him about that and what his team is doing throughout all of this and the coronavirus PSA that he did a video for, which I'm sure you've seen remixed a bunch of times. And then I got real dangerous. And this is even worse because it was a carryover of something I was saying I was going to do last week, but then we got busy. And then I only did the one pod, but we have, I've got like a legal pad here with all sorts of numbers. So I'm just going to warn people ahead of time after the Coach O interview.

I don't even know that I'll want to listen to it after I do it. There's a lot of information in there. I will try to make it enjoyable, but I think it's important stuff. I love CBAs. I was talking to an NFL reporter last night. Cause I was asking about something. I was like, Hey, can you help me out with this a little bit?

And he's like, what? I go, I just love collective bargaining agreements. He's like, okay, cool. So today's episode of the Ryan Russo podcast on the ringer podcast network is

brought to you by state farm. Just like basketball. The game of life is unpredictable. Talk to a state farm agent and get a teammate who can help you navigate the unexpected and unexpected trade, perhaps like the best receiver, arguably in the NFL, Deandre Hopkins to the Arizona Cardinals.

So the Texas traded a guy who, by the way, we told you on this podcast through, I don't know, two thirds of the season. I forget exactly the date of that podcast, but I had said, Hey, look, the Deandre Hopkins stuff with Bill O'Brien is a problem. Um, and I don't know what it means. Plenty of guys have issues and they still find a way to work it out, but they did not. And Hopkins is now on Arizona and they get back a pick. David Johnson, a running back who's still very expensive, who was nice. I'm sure if you play fantasy, you're like,

what are you talking about? David Johnson's awesome. He's not somebody you trade Hopkins for. I never thought of Hopkins as the best receiver. Antonio Brown was in that group, Odell Beckham Jr., Julio Jones. I always felt like A.J. Green was underrated. Definitely some health stuff there as he closed out the season injured. But the more you would talk to guys, and I know for long, Hopkins was his guy. He'd be like, you know what? I would take him. Not to break away speed, but he breaks every ball. We've joked before.

There's no 50-50 balls to DeAndre Hopkins. They're all like 80-20s. It's his ball. Sorry. So as more and more people just started, stop worrying about all the flashiness of some of those other guys. Although Brown's probably the best route runner. He's out of the mix. Not quite sure if he's been in the news at all lately. Odell is dynamic and flashy as he is. Just every week, week in and week out, Odell is not Hopkins. And so that is a great trade for Arizona. And we can talk about contract and all that kind of stuff. It doesn't matter because

the cap always goes up in the NFL and we are going to get to that and look at the cap constantly going up in the NFL with some of the number stuff a little bit later. So there you go. Get a teammate who can help you navigate the unexpected. Talk to a State Farm agent today. Again, that opened from State Farm. That was a long one, though, Kyle. So I don't know how they feel about that one. Just say State Farm a couple more times. Oh, they love you, man.

They love you. Okay. Yeah, because I'm not going to do unpredictable NBA game outcome stuff because that's it. Also, if you want to check out, Bill and I, we're still doing every Sunday. We're into it.

We're all over the place. And I want to say this, too. I really appreciate the people that understand because it's almost all of you that understand, hey, we don't want to do a bummed out virus update podcast for an hour and a half, two hours. And we know that's not what you want. So we appreciate, and I know that both he and I talked about it afterwards. It's just like, hey, you almost feel like you have to do this kind of announcement at the beginning. We're like, look, we get how serious this is, but we still want to have some light-hearted moments and i know that's what most of you want to do on all these podcasts so i'm just going to keep

cranking them out and some will be fun and some will be some different stuff because i don't have the game stuff to go over but we'll figure it out we'll uh keep providing you stuff because we know uh if this gets weirder you know there's going to be limited options for any entertainment other than video games and Netflix. Speaking of, we all know as a writer I had to stop playing video games, but I bought a PS4. Wow. Yeah. Not an Xbox, but a PS4. Great. Yeah, I felt a bit like a noob, I'll be honest with you.

I mean, and this is somebody who played them steadily for a very, very long time. And then once I packed up at Kinetic, I said, that's it, done. Actually, I packed it up before I even moved because I was like, look, if you're really going to do this, you can't have video games as any kind of distraction. But the gym is closed now officially. They closed last night. This is kind of where, you remember Rocky when he went to Siberia to try to learn the Russian way. Come on. What?

What'd you laugh at? No, I just, I'm waiting for the connection. Oh, I know it's going to be, so it's hitting home a little bit more now, you know,

like he, that he couldn't be the Russian unless he somehow became the enemy and understood the enemy better. Right. Right. This feels like a bill segment. So I'm going to not infringe upon him. I don't think Bill really caught my Harrison Ford Chewbacca, Han Solo, old man and the dog thing last night. I got it.

We were separated, so that was tough. And then I felt like I was messing with a guy. And then I just was like, I don't know what to do. He's not a huge Star Wars guy, though. He's not a Star Wars guy. No. Shamelessly about it, too. He loves it.

Wait a minute. He loves saying he doesn't like Star Wars? I don't understand. He's seen them, though, right? I mean, that would be stupid. I think his story might even change. Sometimes he says yes, sometimes no. No way.

I think he does it to bother me. He's watched more bad movies than anyone I've ever met. I'm sure he's seen the originals. There's no way he didn't see Star Wars at some point. But that's a very good point, Kyle. People who haven't watched Star Wars feel I don't know like it's this prideful thing.

It's like the Thrones people. The anti-Thrones people. But even that one you're still denying yourself. Like I was a little late to the Thrones thing because in the very beginning I was like, ah, it's a little rough. I'm throwing subtitles on like what's going on. And I didn't appreciate the scope. I didn't appreciate the books and the magnitude of what they were doing. And then I just sort of missed the boat for a little bit. And then I got back on it and then just plowed through it.

And I go, what a dumb thing that was not buying into that. Like all you're doing is punishing yourself, denying yourself amazing entertainment. and you would think people just with star wars i mean it's such a different level than even game of thrones because it was this this global thing when we had less options for entertainment and still the first one i was way too young but i was into it and then empires was like the shit you know dudes are just reenacting hoth scenes at recess and whenever i've met somebody's like oh i've never seen it like you don't win an award like there's no check that's coming your way every time you puff your chest out and say oh i've never like why wouldn't you want to at least sample something that is a part of american

history really i mean you know when you look at the entertainment culture side of it all so uh i don't understand prideful never never seen it, Star Wars guys. I'm just going to go ahead and say that to you right now. So we'll get a little dangerous with the numbers, but joining us, he's the head coach of the LSU Tigers, the national champs. And I was lucky enough to see a bunch of these games this year, Ed Ogeron, Coach O. Right now, let's start with just what we're all dealing with here now

is this uncertain world. What can you do with the team? What is the NCAA telling you? How much of this have you even been able to figure out on what you can or can't do with the team in a facility? Yeah, you know, it's ever-changing every day. They are not allowing the facility to work out at all. Most of our guys are going to stay here through Thursday.

Our nutrition is open. Our academic center is open. They're probably going to volunteer to work out on their own outside of this facility, but that cannot be instructed by us. I think as the week goes on, most of the boys and young men will go home to their parents, which, you know, rightfully so. I think this is a new wave.

We have to learn how to maneuver through this wave. The next week, we have spring break. And then when they come back, everybody's going to be taking online classes. So, we just need to figure out what we can and what we can't do. Obviously, follow all the rules, but compete in the best way to keep our team together.

You know, I really feel like today's athlete, like one of the great positives is, even though social media can be a negative, is that they see everybody else working out, they're posting all their stuff, real or not, they see it. Would you agree that like today's college athlete seems to be more invested time-wise than maybe ever before because he wants to feel like he's doing everything he can,

and that may even lead to the guys working out totally on their own, maybe more so than younger guys, you know, back in the day. For sure, especially in this league, especially in the SEC West. You know, we're motivated. We have guys that are highly motivated. They want to be champions, which we are. They want to be first-round picks. They want to go to the NFL.

So most of these guys have had trainers since they're maybe 12, 13 years old. I'm sure most of them will go back to their trainers. Most of them, back in the day when I grew up, there wasn't a gym. We had universal weights.

Everybody's got a gym to work out now. Free weights. I'm sure guys got their own gyms to go work out. I'm sure some units will go work out together, but'm sure guys got their own gyms to go work out. I'm sure some units will go work out together, but that's strictly on their own. I think a guy like Miles, a quarterback, could be a redshirt junior for those

that don't know. He's a big-time recruit. Then Joe comes in and transfers in, but he's been waiting on this probably a year later than he thought. How does that work with your quarterback and what you can do with him, what he's asking you? And this isn't anything of like just like a lot of these questions, all of the questions you're going to be asked,

the answer could change tomorrow, but I'm just curious as of today. Yeah, you know, here's a chance for Miles to be a leader of a football team. Strictly on their own, they could go off campus somewhere and he could call the receivers and they could go throw footballs together. I think that would be a good start. And obviously continue to study. They have their iPads.

They have all of our film. They have all of our cut-ups. We're looking at ways right now to see if coaches can send them some stuff electronically and we can stay in touch with those guys and stay ahead of the game. What kind of feedback are you getting on the coronavirus video

that we're seeing? Well, obviously I'm happy that the governor asked me to do it. He and I are very good friends. I was honored to do it. A lot of people called me and said, thank you, coach, for doing it. Obviously, we respect what's going on around the country.

I think it's something that's obviously very serious. I think that, as we see every day, it's moving and moving. I think it's going to affect our country for a little while, but I know that our country will learn how to fight and we'll get through this. I agree with you. This year, as it kept playing out from the beginning of that Texas win against what I still thought was a good Texas team

despite some of their struggles in the season, when did it feel like we can beat anybody? You know, after that third and 17, I went back to play at Texas. Yeah, so we got up to team. Obviously, after that third and 17 in the Texas game? Yeah.

Yeah. So we got up to team. Obviously, you know, after beating Alabama, I think that, I think that I felt that we had a really, really good football team.

I don't know. I don't think that we could beat anybody. I knew we had to play very well and we had to get better on defense. You know, after beating Georgia, which is a very good team, and then beating Oklahoma the way we did, I felt very confident going into the championship game.

Because you got backed up a bunch of times there early offensively, and they're up, and it's Clemson. You know, we've seen what they've done the last few years. Yeah. But you were never worried, I'm assuming. No. We didn't blink. You know, with a quarterback like Joe and the offense that we had and the defense

that we were playing, I just believed that our team and our coaching staff told us that I knew we were going to get out the hole. I knew Joe was going to make the play. So when you have a quarterback, the Heisman Trophy winner, the guy with the tangible, like Joe Burrow, you feel like you're in every game you have a chance to win. With the athletes that

we have, and especially with the high-scoring offense that we have, I felt that we were going to win the game at all times. What's been the best thing that's happened to you since that title game? You know, the opportunity to start the season

of 2020. I couldn't wait to be honest with you. I accepted the opportunity to start the season of 2020, I couldn't wait, to be honest with you. You know, accepting the challenge, letting that season obviously soak in and digest it and put it away and accept the challenge of this new season. You know, we had 16 guys in the combine. I'm very proud of those guys. We're half six first round draft choice.

So we got the next man up. We got to step up. So, we have some great coaches on the staff. I'm very excited to hire Bo Pellini, Scott Linehan, and the great Kevin Falken running back. So, we feel like we've got some really good coaches on our staff. But, you know, put the pieces together for a new year, I think I look forward to that the most.

Did you bring in Bo to just kind of have a calming presence on the sidelines? Yeah. Really, I brought him in to run the 4-3 defense, and I've known Bo for a long time. Pete Carroll told me that he was the best defense of mine he's

ever been with, and I think that we're going to be better on defense because we're going to be attacking more and using our skills in the right place. Give me your best. We saw a lot of the vines, but give me your best White House story visiting after winning the title. Well, you know,

the first thing, I thought Trump was great. I could use him as a recruiter. He was with us for two hours and the guy was phenomenal. I think overall, he took a picture with every one of our players in the Oval Office. I thought that was a very special moment.

Do you think he'd be a better recruiter than you, though? Because I don't, at least not in Louisiana. I'm not sure about that, no. Yeah, I'm not sure about that. I think he does have some recruiting ability. Yeah, we found that out a couple years ago. There's a part of me

that will never forget sitting down with you at walk-ons. It was you, me. It was Danny Cannell. You'd taken over there after that fourth game in 2016. I had obviously known about you back to the first USC stint.

You had this great run and you were really candid about it because it's like, you know, every football program feels like there has to be a coach, but the coach has to be a perfect fit for their culture and that you were just not going to be accepted by Los Angeles. And you got a little emotional about it. Can we go back to that time and like what it felt like to be deprived of something you deserve, but because you weren't LA and then you end up home, what was that like? Because it had to be massive disappointment followed by an unbelievable

opportunity. Yeah. You know, it's called perseverance. It's called competing. It's called being at home. You know, uh, they accept me for who I am over here and obviously winning the national championship is help. Let me clarify something. Los Angeles loved me.

And I love Los Angeles. And there was a lot of people in that town that still love me. There's a couple of people that thought I didn't fit the mold. They were wrong, obviously. Yeah, you're right. I mean, I shouldn't put it as if all, but we understand how the boosters work. We understand how the decision makers work.

And look, they're still trying to figure it out since then. That was just a couple of people that made the wrong decision. And I think nowadays they're paying for it. Yeah, no question. Have you allowed yourself, I mean, now it looks like a lot of people are going to have free time.

Nobody's going to be traveling anywhere. Have you allowed yourself to do anything? Have it looks like a lot of people are going to have free time. Nobody's going to be traveling anywhere. Have you allowed yourself to do anything? Have you done anything different that you've never done before after accomplishing something like this at LSU? No, we're going to work harder. We're in the office longer. On the weekends, we're going to work harder. This is our biggest challenge.

I told our staff, this is our biggest challenge since we lost to Troy. I told our staff, this is our biggest challenge since we lost to Troy. Regaining the momentum, resetting the LSU standard performance for the whole new team. We can do it. It's going to take some work, yes. The biggest thing that we have to do, all of us, is decompress. Quit waving at the parade. All that stuff is gone.

Before you know it, this season's going to hit us. Now, we've been throwing this curveball, and we're going to have to compete. Okay, I'm going to do five questions here. A little quicker. You answer them however you want. Don't worry, I'm not going to try to put you on the spot here.

We do this with some of our select guests, so you made the cut here in honor of Craig Kilbourne. Five questions. Who's the single toughest player you've ever coached? Uh, Warren Sacks. I agree with that one. Um, what is your bench at right now? My bench is at, uh, it always stays a little bit above 300.

I say 350. 350, six plates, easy to work with. Who's the best coach that you've ever coached under? I got to say a guy there, Jimmy Johnson, Pete Carroll. And if everything does work out here, can Blue Bayou expect Ed Ogeron and his immediate family to maybe show up to the water park there once everything gets cleared up here? Are you a big water park guy? Have you been to Blue Bayou, expect Ed Ogeron and his immediate family to maybe show up to the water park there once everything gets cleared up here. Are you a big water park guy?

Have you been to Blue Bayou? No. Well, I got some passes laying around still. So once we're all go, I'll hook those up with Derek or Bonette there. Make sure you get hooked up. All right. You're one of my favorites, and I'd still like you,

even if you were 6-6, but we know that's not going to happen. Not with you, man. Thank you, my friend. I'm very happy for you. We'll talk again soon. Thank you. Thank you, man.

Okay, so that's Coach O. I'll be at Texas, and I'll be at the Bama Games. I'll probably sneak another one in there, and then, you know, who knows? I'm going to bring my brother to his first SEC game. And I already told him, so I don't think that's going to be too big of a surprise.

But I'm excited I'm going to bring him to Texas because he's adopted the LSU thing. A couple of hoodies, a couple of good stories. He's in. He started texting me, you know, later on in the year. He's like, hey, I think they're really good. I was like, yeah, they are. They are. All right.

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If you want to be informed, and I'm going to try to make this playful. And I don't even really know what I did. I know what I started by doing, and then what happens sometimes when I come up with a project in my head, next thing I know, I'm like seven layers to the left. And I'm going, what are we doing here? Are we going to come up with anything? So instead of saying, hey, here's my theory and then ultimate conclusion, there's a little bit of that. But it is looking at NFL revenue, looking at where their salary cap is, how that's impacted things, comparing that to the NBA, and then also including all the updated pieces of the CBA with a new NFL CBA agreed to this week that you should know. And I'll source that out as well because these numbers, you guys are going to

have to allow me to be off by a dollar or two on some of this stuff. And then ultimately what that means for players that are negotiating new deals, i.e. Dak Prescott, who everybody is really, really worried about. I don't think everybody's worried about it, but it's just a lot of coverage. And I, like you, non-Cowboys fans, can't believe how much time is devoted to a Cowboy player and how much he makes. It's so effing annoying. Anyway, so let's talk numbers. Where do we start? Anyway, so let's talk numbers. Where do we start? Okay.

NFL revenue in 2001 was around $4.3 billion. And in the past year that we have the numbers for, it was just about $15 billion going back to 2018. Certainly 2019 would be above that. Ratings were up the last two years after dips in 16 and 17. Roger Goodell said, I believe a couple of years ago, but has repeated this, that he had a target of a $25 billion revenue year by 2027. So think about that. 2001, 5 billion. He wants to get it to 25 billion in just 26 years later. That's an insane amount of growth. And as I said on Bill's podcast before, whenever you look at any of these companies, whether it's a company that you use, an Amazon or Apple or anything like

that, or a league here, your value is based on growth. Stocks value, and it's more complicated than this, and I'm not admitting or professing myself to be any kind of expert on it, but when something new pops up, like there are big companies that don't have great stock numbers. Their stock isn't worth that much because they're just like, okay, that's who you are. This is what you're going to do and you're not really going to grow at all. The NFL wanted to add different markets around the world. They wanted to add a playoff game. They wanted to add a regular season game or games, plural. We'll get to that a little bit later because they want to be able to show growth and they definitely want to do it in front of a new television contract.

And that's the whole point of all of this stuff. Think how easy this was. Like sometimes growth means acquiring and actually out-of-pocket expenses or research and development or all these different things that you have to do, or, Hey, I'm going to start a business and I'm not going to pay myself for the first five years. The NFL just kind of snapped their fingers and make-believe created new inventory, not make-believe, but you know what I'm saying? There wasn't a massive amount of resources poured into adding more programming here. It's just now the new TV deal isn't just valuable because of a more recent date that's negotiated. It's more valuable because now there's even more inventory, an absolute win

for the NFL owners. Now let's look at cap numbers because the NFL and NBA, their players are in more of a partnership than it is employer and employee. And those numbers, the partnership is really based on how they split up the revenue. Pretty simple, right? We all seem to accept the philosophy of 50-50. I don't know how that's happened. It just makes sense. We've heard it our whole lives. Hey, 50-50, 50-50. I don't know if 50-50 is terrible for players. I don't know if it's terrible for owners. I mean, what if it was always 70-30, one way or the other? Would we just accept it because that's what we were told all the time? If the person that was older and the person that started it or came to you and said, hey,

it's 70-30, those are just the rules. That's something in society that we've just sort of accepted, and I'm not even close to knowing philosophically what the right split is. But let's all just say it's 50-50, even though the NBA at times has been 57%. Now it's more around 48%, and there's a bunch of variables that can move it. The NFL at one point was 60% of the revenue, and now it's under 50%, and it gets to kind of like 48 or so. So it is kind of funny how the NFL and NBA can mimic each other, but players actually used to make a much bigger cut. And it isn't whether they win or lose during CBA negotiations for the players. It's really the real question is how much did we lose? Not did we win or lose, but how much did we lose? Because they keep losing that split as these franchises

appreciate on paces that we've never, ever seen before. And the reason they appreciate is because of the TV deals. So in 2001, the NFL salary cap was $71 million. The top contract that year was Drew Bledsoe, who just signed a big extension. We're going to get to a couple fake extensions here too, because I just think they're fun. Bledsoe signed for 10.3 mil that year in 2001. That was his annual salary. He's 14% of the salary cap. Behind him, Favre at just over 10 million.

Achilles Smith was the third highest average annual salary that year at 8 million. Steve McNair was just under 8 at 7.8. Those guys are about 11% of the salary cap. In 2010, it was technically an uncapped year. 2009 was 123 million. 2011 was $120 million. So there was a bit of a dip there once they renegotiated everything. And the uncapped year, everybody thought was going to be a free for all. It wasn't. And the owners knew that even though everybody's like, oh my gosh, an uncapped year. What's to stop a team from doing this? Well, they just, they didn't really do it. Manning was the number one average annual salary that year for $18 million at 15% of the salary caps. There was actually a bit of a bump. Brady's at $18 million. Eli was at $16 million. Vic was $16 million. And Phillip Rivers was just over $15 million. So ranging from 15% of the salary cap to about 13% of the salary cap. Now in 2019, the salary cap was 188.2 mil. So about $188 million. The

salary cap projections for 2020 are just under 200 million. So the salary cap has been on this steady incline or an increase, but it hasn't been as dramatic as the NBA one that we're going to get to there a little bit, but I still feel like it's overlooked. Whenever I hear about teams complaining about salary caps, I go, you guys get this 5% bonus basically every single year. And I know it's not a 20% bonus here, but there's ways around it. It always goes up. So it was 71 million 20 years ago. So we're looking at a bump of 180% and 66% just a decade ago. And when you look at the average annual salaries on the books for 2019, Russell Wilson is a 35 million, 17.5% of the cap. So a mistake that I had made in the past, and it's worth me repeating here, is that when we saw these massive jumps in NBA salaries,

which is a direct relation to the salary cap because the rules are a little bit different, I never felt like there was that massive bump for the NFL quarterback who essentially is the NBA player of the NFL. Now, really, the mistake that I was making was I was just looking at the average annual salary. By only looking at the average annual salary, I was kind of breaking my own rule here. But if you look at the guaranteed money, that's always been my hangup. And that's where I've really corrected myself is that the guaranteed money has not kept pace with the average annual salary. Now the owner, the GM would say, well, yeah, if we're paying these guys more than we ever have before, why should we put in more guaranteed money? I'm telling you right now, if NFL players got to true free agency, true free

agency, no franchise tag, the amount of money that would be guaranteed on these deals would be astronomical in comparison to the structure they have today. So the average annual salaries have gone up and they've actually gone up in relation to the actual cap because at 35 million, Russ is about 17 and a half percent of the salary cap. And when you go back to Bledsoe, he was 14%. You go back to Peyton, he was 15%. Ben Roethlisberger, 17% of the cap. Jared Goff's at 17% of the cap. His was front loadedloaded. Garoppolo's is front-loaded there too. So that can get a little tricky because the average annual salaries can be a little fluctuating,

a bit fluctuating in the NFL. But that's kind of how the growth that we've seen. Again, 71 million in 2001, 200 million going into this year. And a steady, steady, not massive increase for the quarterbacks. And I still think the guaranteed money is absolutely lagging.

But just like 50-50, society has accepted that NFL quarterbacks or really any NFL player can't have guaranteed contracts. Now there's always this legalese in it. It's like, well, the NBA and Major League Baseball, they don't have guaranteed contracts. Yes, you're right. There are opt-out years. There are non-guaranteed years at the back end of it. There's vesting years in baseball and all these different things. Here's what I know, is that when a baseball player signs for like 160 million, it usually means he signed for 160 million. And if an NBA player is really, really good, the option year is probably on him. So it's not the same. It is different. And the NFL player doesn't do as well with this because I think there's generations that just think there's

no way you can have guaranteed money for NFL players. And I just think if it was all guaranteed, they would just move the numbers around a little bit more and quarterbacks would still get paid. So here's the other thing that I want to do. Now, the NBA has less players. So when we look at the average annual salary, and I know that sounds like, hey, that's not breaking news. Well, plenty of NFL players, when NBA guys signed for big money, seemed to lose track of the fact that 15 is a lot smaller than 53. But the NBA salary cap in 2000 was $35.5 million. KG actually made $19.6 that year. Remember, KG turned down a massive contract with Minnesota. This is before the rules were kind of changed around, so he had some grandfather deal in there, and he was making major money. He and Shaq were at over 19 million, which means KG made 55% of the salary cap, just his salary alone. But we know that in the NBA,

the cap is a soft cap. And the luxury tax back then, especially back then, was far less restrictive than it is today. So Shaq made 54%. Then there was a bit of a drop. Zoe was the third highest paid player in 2000 at 17 million. and then Juwan Howard at 16.9. 2010, the NBA salary cap was at 57 million. Kobe made 43.5% of the cap with his contract. He was at 24.8 million, which was about five or six, yeah, five million more than Rashard Lewis. One of my favorite things about going back and look at the highest paid players is back then the NBA was so bad. There's so many guys that made a ton of money that you're like,

that guy has two tattooed on his forehead. He's so not a one, he's a two. So the top salary is 2010. Again, Kobe just under 25 million, Rashard Lewis 19.5 million, Tim Duncan at 18.8, KG is 2010. Again, Kobe just under $25 million. Rashard Lewis, $19.5 million. Tim Duncan at $18.8. KG at $18.8. And then Michael Redd was the fifth highest paid player in the league that year. Okay?

The cap then went, in just a very short amount of time, from $57 million to $109 million with the new TV deal. There's a point to all this. Trust me. A jump of 91%. So the salary cap in this current year is just about $109 million. You're looking at a jump of 207% from 20 years ago from where the cap number was before. That's insane. Steph makes 40.2. Russ is at 38.5. CP3 is threes at 38 five Katie's at 38 Lillard actually with his new

extension is going to make 49 million starting next year yes but you could see at the top end it wasn't what you had 20 years ago where KG was making 55 and Shaq was making 54% Steph is making 37% of the cap again the NBA has some different how much

can you possibly sign for the max deal in relation to percentage of of the cap. And again, the NBA has some different, how much can you possibly sign for the max deal in relation to percentage of what the cap is. So there really aren't, when I went through it for 19 and 20, there aren't that many, what the bleep contracts other than maybe Tobias Harris is probably the one you'd have to go down the list and even understand why it happened that way. But you go, wow, how much is he making? So why did I go through all of these things? I went through them all because in relation to the TV deal, which is why the NFL wanted the CBA to be done. Okay. So I'm going through all of those numbers because it's all related to the TV deal. All of it. The NBA's TV deal, the new one that basically tripled their television revenue,

was signed at the end of 2014. The new deal started in 2016 and 17. And that's when we had that massive spike. And NBA teams wanted Michelle Roberts and the Players Association to soften the cap increases, but still pay the players. Whatever the split is, if it's 48%, you're still all going to make your 48%. We just don't want all of this cap space to be out there and disrupt things. And honestly, that ended up being something that changes Durant's legacy, impacts LeBron's legacy, impacts Curry's legacy. Because look, I know know everybody the Curry stuff

they still were going to be a good team without Durant but there's a good chance he never wins that other ring with the ring right two more rings does LeBron have another one you know does Durant win one in Oklahoma City with Russell Westbrook do we do that thing where it's rings season and we start looking at Westbrook differently? But that cap spike, I get what Michelle and the NBA Players Association were doing is that, oh, wait, the owners want to do some sort of restrictive thing about all this new thing or the teams are flush with cash. No, we don't want to do it. But what I would have done if I were a player and said, well, why is Reggie Jackson making 70 million? Why is Alan Crabb making 70 million? Why is Evan Turner making 70 million? Is that really

the way it works? It's like, no, no. When you get to free agency, don't worry. You're going to get hooked up. No, no, no. I'd like to be hooked up now and let's just spread all this money out. And the players just totally, I don't think the players understood it, honestly. I really don't. And I don't know that, I think Michelle Roberts was just like, hey, I'm in charge of players association. You guys proposed that. I'm just going to say no, because it came from your side. So done and done. So the old TV deal for the NBA was an eight-year $966 million deal. That jumped to $2.6 billion. So you were making $120.1 million on the old TV deal. And in the new TV deal, you were making almost $290 million. And that's why your cap went from what we first mentioned there in 2010 at 57 million to what it is now at 109 million. But it was immediate. It

was rapid. And again, it wasn't 57 to 109, but you understand it was like a 70 million jump into I don't know, around 100 million. So if the NFL deal was nine years from 2014 to 2022, and that deal was first reported at $27 billion in 2011, and that number is way off because the NFL makes about a billion dollars from CBS on the current deal, about a billion from Fox, just under a billion technically from NBC. billion from Fox, just under a billion technically from NBC. They make over a billion from ESPN, and it's more about Monday than the wildcard game, which they pay too much for. But there's also other parts of it that you have to understand where it's access to highlights. Like if you don't have rights, and then you have a show called SportsCenter, ever heard of it? And you're like, hey, sorry, we didn't want to do an NFL TV deal. And now we can't show you highlights. It just doesn't work that way. And then AT&T and the direct ticket, that's another billion and a half. We're looking at over maybe five and a half billion dollars in annual TV revenue. That's right now. That is

more than double what the NBA is making, and it should make more because it is a more desirable desirable product. Now, with work security, with a new CBA, labor peace until 2030, the NFL, and another reason why they wanted to push this through is they're coming off of this nice ratings rebound. Although if I were on the other side of the TV deal, I'd go, hey, look, so wait a minute, I was supposed to lowball you after 16 and 17, and now you're asking us for the absolute premium. And look, they're still going to get the premium. We can talk about technology and less time in front of a TV and more options than ever before. There's still always the most desirable beach house in a down real estate market. There always is. There's always the one thing you'd want more than everybody else. And as much as this is changing around us, and I can't predict the future of how all of this entertainment will be consumed, the NFL is still king.

So is it even fair to suggest they could double that? I mean, if the NBA almost tripled it, now we could get into it and say, oh, the NBA, they were undervalued, and then they stepped up. When John Skipper, president of ESPN, did that deal, people laughed at him. And they laughed when he said, hey, by the end of this 10-year deal, people are going to look at this as inexpensive. It's like an absolute bargain. Depending on the year, I don't know that we really know. But a lot of these deals, the second half of it, you go, you know, it's a pretty good deal as that. And especially with ESPN, with all of the channels, and you just need programming.

And it's live rights. It's live rights. I sat meetings with Skipper, just he and I, I'd meet with him usually once every six months and maybe once a year, you know, there'd be gaps and he would just go like, I don't know. We never even really talked about me that morning. Just be like live rights, live rights, live rights, live rights. So if you are Fox, CBS, NBC, ESPN, the direct TV package, all of these things. And Goodell's saying, we want to get a $25 billion in revenue by 2027. And the adjustments here are that a little less than half of the NFL revenue every year is from television. That's why when you see a Dak Prescott turn down a lot of money,

and for those of you that are acting like the Cowboys are cheap when they're basically never cheap, Jerry Jones paid way too much for Ezekiel Elliott. That's the only team that would have done that deal. I don't know. Maybe the Texans are capable of anything right now. But what I believe to be true is that it's not they don't want to pay Dak. It's that Dak looks at this and going, why do I want to do a new deal now under the old terms? And why wouldn't I just wait? I'm going to get franchised. I'm going to get paid like a top five guy. I'm still going to get a ton of money. And if I'm asking for 37 to 40 million a year, 40 million a year as a quarterback and a guy that, look, we can all sit here and debate how great what the ceiling or what the floor for Dak is. We could do that if we want. But what this is really about for some of these players

that are coming up, specifically quarterbacks, and this is what I'd be doing if I were an agent, and we can talk about injuries, but honestly, a lot of these guys, we really overblow the injury part of it because most of the guys, there aren't career-ending injuries happening in this sport that much anymore, if at all,

and certainly not with quarterbacks. And I don't want to hear the exception because the majority of them are going to play even after a major injury, but you would have to start thinking, well, what's wrong with getting franchised and, and waiting this out a little bit to see what the new TV market looks like. And if we have an NFL version of the NBA cap spike. I don't know. Again, I have no idea what the numbers will be on this, but a lot of times when it's this massive, you're better off going, hey, what would be reasonable? Would $8 billion a year be reasonable?

Well, then just add 20% and 25% when networks are bidding after something that's the most important product you can put on a network. And that's what I think you're going to see with some of these guys. I do. Instead of like, hey, what if the cap goes to $260 million? I mean, think about where it was. Think about where it was. It was $120 million 10 years ago. It's $200 million now.

And that's on an older TV deal. I don't know. I can read all the projections just like you can. But it's at least something to think about. Before I review all the new CBA stuff, today's podcast is sponsored by ADT Commercial for Business. ADT Commercial serves businesses ranging from midsize organizations to large-scale enterprises. Think of them as a special team who has one focus, your business security.

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with ADT Commercial for Business. No pain that's good in sports and good in business security. Visit ADT.com forward slash gameday to learn more. That's ADT.com forward slash gameday. The new CBA. Went through Dan Graziano's piece on ESPN.

Really good. Check it out. I'll give you the cliff notes of it. The owner's option for 17 games, that starts in a window in 2021. It goes to 2023. They have the option to expand the season to 17 games starting in 2021.

Go ahead and lock that one in. I guess there could be some scheduling conflicts that wouldn't have it happen right in 2021, but I don't know, man. Extra revenue. you figure it out. The current player cut is 47%. It's now a 48% split, and it could go from 48.5% to 48.8%. And that's based on if the TV revenues increase by 60 to 100%. Think about that. They're building in these models already for a CBA revenue split based on projections of the revenues increasing 60 to 120%. The minimum players really made out of this, 60% of the players are on minimum salary deals.

of the players are on minimum salary deals. And there's about 20% bump here on minimums. 510,000 is going to be the new number in 2030 when this deal expires. Minimum players are going to be making just over a million dollars a year. This was probably my favorite part of the negotiation is do you remember when the extra game was proposed and they were saying, all right, it's an extra game, but we'll throw on another 200,000 max for each player. That was absurd. And it was negotiating one-on-one. And again, you have to have something of value to negotiate, whether it's what you bring or what the other person provides for you. A lot of times in our life, we don't really have anything of value to negotiate. So you can sit there and act like you're the CEO of you, Rick Ross style. But if it's on a

landscaping crew, there's a good chance they're going to say, hey, leave the rake. So when that was first proposed, again, negotiating one-on-one, let's offer some absurd thing that is absolutely a no as a distraction with the fact that all we want is the 17th game and then we'll just figure it out. So the compromise was, hey, here's the thing. If you make, and this is a good point by Graziano, if you make 17 million a year, you will make one 17th more with the extra game. So you go from 17 to $18 million a year. The players are always going to be compensated for that. So if you're all about player safety and you didn't even want the extra money, then congrats to you. I'm telling you, I've gotten into arguments with former players about that being like, yeah, well, I'll believe it when we see it. And I'm like, you guys don't realize if it's 47%, it's 48% of the cut,

you're just going to make 48% of what the new money is. You're going to be compensated for the extra game. And they'd be like, no. like all right it'd be fun to negotiate with you um but they offered something so dumb and what they did with that well it wasn't dumb it was brilliant because it was just an absurd suggestion that players weren't going to make any more than a couple hundred grand but they were smart in proposing it because it distracted everybody from what their ultimate goal was in the extra game and they were also looking at who was voting, who was voting for these changes. And the vote was very close. It was almost like a thousand plus to just over 900.

It was like 60 votes in favor of this new CBA. And I imagine a lot of them lowered salary guys were voting for this. And maybe a lot of the lower salary guys were thinking, hey, a couple hundred grand. That's great for me. I actually think that was a tactic by the league and the owners. And it was brilliant because it worked. Guarantees. I already talked about that before. I'm not going to get into it because it just, it could be changed and it isn't. And talking to anybody that's ever sat through negotiations in the NFL side of it.

I mean, they could get absolutely destroyed if the owners decided they wanted to do it. They could because the window is shorter and you're talking about 2,000 people voting instead of just 100, not 100, but a couple hundred in the NBA. Game day rosters, 46 to 48. One has to be an offensive lineman, 14 membermember practice squad in 2022, so that's up about four spots. The franchise tag. Apparently, that was a non-starter for the owners, and it's smart if you're an owner because it prevents true free agency. I've read people say, oh, it doesn't really matter. There's only a handful of guys that are ever on the franchise tag. I have made that

mistake. I've read people make that mistake. And it's a huge mistake because if you're an NFL writer, it just means that you're taking word for word what a GM or an owner is telling you because it's a great vehicle for the team to control the players. And it's a great vehicle for the owners to keep costs down, especially on that guaranteed money. The fact that it exists is a deterrent to real free agency. It's not that it's, oh, it's only a few players that are ever really franchised that don't get a new deal worked out. But remember, who is voting on this? We're talking 2000.

It was supposed to be way more votes, but a lot of guys didn't even vote, by the way, which seems absurd to be a member of the NFLPA and then not vote on this kind of thing. Because you'd like to think, hey, are you guys going to vote for yourselves? Are you going to always be voting for the future? And I think they did some good things here in the future when you look at that minimum salary being bumped. But if you're talking about all of these guys at the lower end of the spectrum, do you know how many of those guys don't care about the franchise tag? Because they're going, I don't care. I don't know that they're ever going to beat the franchise tag. They won't because it's such a small percentage. It would have to be a philosophical

thing where the players union goes, we are so opposed to this. We have to be against it in whatever the next CBA is. And you would have to have a bunch of guys that have no, like, it's not even on their radar. Like, hey, were you willing to give up something so that something that doesn't impact you is changed? You know what most people's answer to that is? No. So the first round pick, four years guaranteed. That was the case.

The fifth year option can be guaranteed, but it has to be decided before the fourth year, which is new. It used to be the league year. And that always reminds me of how NBA first round picks had four years of guaranteed money until I feel like the league finally realized that picks in the twenties are one of the most overrated assets in the NBA. And you're like, why do I have to pay a guy four years of guaranteed money that I picked 28th? And then when that rule was changed, because it wasn't that long ago, Patrick O'Brien, I can't remember if it was here, Joe Alexander were the first guys that didn't even have their third-year option picked up. When you get picked in the lottery and the team's like,

you know what, we're not even picking up your third year. That's not great, Bob. And by the way, you can't have your fines waived anymore after a holdout. So they did change the holdout stuff there. Oh, by the way, smoke all the weed you want. So sweet. Less practice, more weed, and I don't know, man.

I get what the players are trying to do. I like the minimum salary thing here a little bit, but they didn't get a big chunk back their way in the revenue split. They gave the 17th game the extra playoff game this lines up perfectly for the owners it lines up perfectly for them to get a massive massive new

tv deal and you can sit there and say oh it doesn't really matter because the player is going to make so much more on the new tv deal just like the nba guys did but no it's it's not about the overall number it's what is your split and uh no that's why in the beginning when there's these press leases saying, Oh, we've, we've shifted 5 billion in revenue to the player's side. I'm like, well,

that's, that's one way of putting it, but the owner's going to clean up on this new TV deal. And like I said before, it's not, do you win or lose? How much did you not lose if you're a player? So there you go.

A little lesson there. And if you want the, uh, Graziano piece, it's very easy to read. And I just kind of paraphrased it there for you. So, that's our podcast. Thank you for making it all the way through.

Because that means you're treated to a tease of the return of the Mac. Not Khalil Mac, but Chris Long. I went on his podcast last week. He wants to do Home and Home. And big conferences kind of roll that way. So, that's how we're going to do it. So, he's going to be on. Big Cat may be joining us for a three-way festival draft.

That's kind of what we were thinking of doing. I don't know. I'm not a big festival guy. Those two dudes are. We're going to go 10 picks each. Try to put together the best festival lineup. Does it seem immature? Lame?

It could be both. But you won't know until you listen to it on Thursday. Everybody hang in there. Seriously. And you can follow me at Ryan Aversillo for all of these links. And me probably sitting out some of the stuff the next couple days.

So, like I said, in all honesty, seriously, thanks for listening. We'll figure this out. Thank you.