We recently explained that the various levels of restricted free agency tenders include a little-known lowest level that entails a right to match but no compensation.
As applied to the uncapped year, the significance of that specific tender comes from the absence of a provision that pushes the player’s compensation to 110 percent of his prior year’s pay. If, for example, the Chargers hope to merely have the ability to match whatever offer running back Darren Sproles might receive on the open market, the Chargers can offer him $1.226 million -- and not 110 percent of his 2009 franchise player salary of $6.621 million.
Some league insiders believe that separate language from Article XIX of the Collective Bargaining Agreement trumps that text setting forth the lowest level tender. Specifically, section (f) of Article XIX states that a restricted free agent “shall have the option of accepting a one year NFL Player Contract for 110% of his Prior Year Paragraph 5 salary (with all other terms of his prior year contract carried forward unchanged) in lieu of a Player Contract for the applicable alternative amount specified in this paragraph, if he so wishes, regardless of which Player Contract is for a greater amount.”
A league source tells us that the NFLPA does not interpret this provision to permit a player tendered at the lowest level to push his pay to 110 percent of his prior year’s salary. As the source explained, a literal interpretation agrees with the position that a player tendered at the lowest level can nevertheless choose the 110-percent option. The source said that the NFLPA believes that such an interpretation conflicts with the purpose of the lowest-level, right-of-first-refusal-only tender.
The union maintains, we’re told, that the availability of the 110-percent alternative “would subvert the substance of agreed upon intent of allowing the [right of first refusal] tender without the 110% increase.” Added the source, “The NFLPA is being honorable with respect to the agreed upon intent of the [right of first refusal] regardless of [section (f)], which appears to be a loophole.”
So what is the purpose of section (f)? As best we can tell, it would allow a guy to take 110 percent of his base salary from the prior year, even if it falls below the stated value of the tender. And the player would choose to do that if the amounts are close, and if the base salary from the prior year was guaranteed. Section (f) gives the player the express ability to choose to take 110 percent of his prior year’s salary, even if that amount is less than the amount of the otherwise non-guaranteed tender.
Meanwhile, we’re not so sure that the NFLPA is being magnanimous on this issue. We think the union would love to see some players be subject to a right of first refusal with no compensation, since it would open the door for the Hutchinson/Burleson poison pill to be used, which would encourage player movement -- or give the union ammunition for yet another legal challenge that ultimately would be decided by Judge David Doty, the jurist whom the league tried to have kicked off the case last year.
Of course, in the case of Darren Sproles, he’ll have no limitation at all because the Chargers have chosen to extend no tender -- possibly due to the language of Article XIX, section (f).