It just occurred to me, I have no idea what purpose the NFL draft serves.
NFL owners are granted exclusive bargaining rights with individual players. I'm sorry, but that seems like a sham. If I'm NFLPA member, I would be doing everything possible to get rid of the draft. When college players graduate, set a date where owners can begin negotiating contracts with future players. That way there's no monopoly on a player and teams are force to pony up on what they truly believe the player is worth. capitalism like it should be.
To answer your question, the purpose of the draft is to promote competitive balance. That's why the draft order is the reverse order of the standings from the previous season (or at least weighted by them in the case of the NBA and NHL lotteries). To your point about the PA's and players being able to negotiate/ sign with any team they want, they've had some success on that front- that's why we've seen the number of rounds in the draft shrink over time.
Yup if it weren't for the draft a guy like AJ Green would never be in cinci or Luck in Indy. The big boy markets would have out bid everyone else.
I could definitely foresee an NFL similar to the English Premier League with this. In the EPL, its basically the top 6 teams, and then everybody else, because they have more money and are bigger markets. Theres almost no competitive balance, and you pretty much know exactly how the top part of the league is going to shake out. I enjoy the parity we have in the NFL right now, and the draft is what makes that.
Well you could still have a salary cap, so that wouldn't necessarily lead to an imbalance based on market. It might lead to Miami or New York teams getting better because they are more desirable cities to live in than say Buffalo. Also the NFL is an organization that has its bottom line in mind and the competitive balance is a huge benefit to that. So for them it is "capitalism" to have policies like the draft that help maintain that balance.
The owners AND union would not want to get rid of the draft. The union would not want to for 2 reasons:
Reason 1: The owners would ask for something in return (i.e. higher % of revenue).
Reason 2: The union is made up of current players, not future players. Current players don't care about incoming players, especially when it involves lowering their earning potential. You saw how easily they agreed with the owners to lower salaries for incoming players.
The draft does give markets like cincy access to players like aj green, until their initial contract expires that is!
@ausmos - The owners will always be scraping for money. I dont think thats a big surprise or a reason not to fight for it. Although current players might not see direct benefits from changing the draft, i doubt theyd hold back if it was clearly dogging their fellow players. You do bring up a good point in that neither represents the best interest of ncaa football players prior to their first contract.
Are you being serious with this question?
you guys understand the league now has a salary slotting system, right? say i go 8 overall to the vikings: there's very little wiggle room in negotiating, both from my side and from minny's. so, the franchises really have no ability to screw a guy (and even if they could, they wouldn't: when you take a guy in round 1, it's because you need him. you'll pay him what is necessary because you can't avoid a wasted pick. moreover, "exclusive rights" isn't correct. he's yours only for a year after the draft.)
this slotting system was something that the PLAYERS' association fought for, not the owners. 10 year vets were getting understandably pretty upset that sam bradford, jamarcus russell, et al were receiving deals commensurate with established all- pros before they even stepped on the field.
the system of freely-negotiating used to happen in hockey and baseball. they changed it because it was awful. people were getting tired of the canadiens and yankees winning a title every fiscal quarter.
Ok now THAT is an answer thanks 740. Phxbuck youre the worst.