Let’s Eliminate the Draft
September 13, 2023
By Noonefromtampa
By now every football fan has read about Caleb Williams and his desire to be not drafted by a less desirable team in the NFL. So, I started thinking in what way would it be possible to eliminate the draft altogether. The easiest solution is to just allow eligible college players to negotiate and sign with a team that they prefer to go to. At this point in the discussion most folks will start throwing out a number of issues of why that will never work. I will go point by point to address the major issues around eliminating the draft.
Issue #1 – Fans and the NFL love the draft
The draft today has become a PR spectacle for the NFL and generates millions of dollars for both the NFL, the media, and the city the draft is held in. If we eliminate the draft, think how many people will be impacted and how much money will be lost.
The fix for this is to have a signing week held in an NFL city, just like the draft. Hold the same events as the draft. Think of how the NFL turned the NFL Combine into a weeklong media circus. The media can still do all their prospect reviews, mock which players are the best signings for each team and how big of a deal various rookie players deserve. Have a daily TV show to announce team-player pairings.
Issue #2 – It will destroy parity
The salary cap would still be a hard cap and a team cannot exceed it. A wrinkle I would add is a maximum cap percentage a contract could not exceed. A single player could not earn more than 17% of the total cap in a contract year. For 2023 the cap was $224M, so the largest contract salary for a player in one year would be $38M. This spreads the payroll around to more players, not just the quarterback. The cap spending floor would also still be there to prevent cheap owners from keeping the money for themselves. I would also make the maximum contract length two years for unvested players with an optional third year and four years for vested players. Eliminate the franchise tagging of players and allow a team to pick one or two players that they will match an offer on.
Issue #3 – What about trading players for picks?
The trades would now be players (contracts) for cap space. Say Washington wanted to take a run at Williams. In that event, they could trade premier players like Terry McLaurin or Jonathan Allen for cap space to a team that has free cap space available. If a team traded 2 or 3 top end players, they would have $40 million in cap space available to spend on a new QB coming out of college.
Issue #4 – It will hurt small market teams
People always throw out this issue, like nobody ever heard of Brett Favre or Aaron Rodgers. The NFL is a national if not international platform. Great players will get monetary opportunities. Lower tier players may have fewer marketing opportunities in smaller markets, but the top guys will always have the money people coming to them. Agent with clients in smaller markets would have to get more creative in marketing their clients and improving the player’s social media presence.
Issue #5 – My team won’t get any good young players
This may have been an issue for Washington under the previous owner, but fans need to ask why players won’t come to their team. Can they not command a good salary? Is the team poorly run? Does the owner not pay to have good facility or programs for the players? I think eliminating the draft will force teams to be better run and offer better choices for players. A smart owner will create programs or benefits that entice players to want to come to the organization. Things like providing meals for players (not all teams do this today), day care facilities, wealth management training could be a few things offered in the future.
Other Considerations
Eliminating the draft would force teams to better manage their cap space and play personnel moves several years out into the future. The NFLPA may have concerns about veteran players not getting their fair share of money. That could be addressed by subdividing the cap into max a spend (say 35% of the salary cap) on non-vested players to create increased spending on veterans.
Players entering the league under this new model, would get divided into the classic “haves” and “have nots”. Players who would have been drafted in the first few rounds of the draft will be the haves, and the rest of the players would get essentially treated as how undrafted free agents are treated today. About 100-120 players will be chasing significant to decent deals and the other 200-300 players will get minimum levels deals.
Owners would have to invest more money in facilities and programs/benefits for players to market their team better. Like everything else in life there are always some ups and downs with every potential change.
Would you like to eliminate the draft or have some recommendations of your own? Post them in the comments section.