..we'll never know the truthful numbers, but it is likely that Michael Barnett shelled out several hundred million dollars worth of credit capital at these meetings in '08 and '09 to fight off postseason reform, any sort of salary structure regulation, and through his mass of concentrated capital he was able to evade popular opinion; and that's excluding the sweetheart Smithtown lend-lease stadium deal for the Seacooks...
...but the time has come, and when people have their ideas suppressed, they become angry - even if they're the ones accepting the money.. Barnett's games at the negotiation table are the league's worst kept secret and now, armed with just two votes at the table with the Sharks having lost on Friday, he is overcome by a rousing tidal wave..
the deal struck on Tuesday to take the postseason out of the Flat Grounds starting in '11 was not a single action by the owners' body. it marked a turning point. some sources think Barnett gave up on the fight, didn't think it worth a protracted fight. but the passage was hailed as a victory for the non-LI owners, long held hostage by the triad's success on the football field and dwarfing quantity of pure, liquid capital.
with that, they ran, and James Rasbey, Jr. vocally seized the opportunity... the resolution expressing 'the sense of the organizations' interest in a system of salary cap & trade' was dismissed by Barnett.. he stated to me that he could not remember the last time a non-binding resolution was negotiated...
of course, the owners realized weeks ago that they couldn't get away with passing such a motion so directly related to player salaries without the consent of the Union, which is what Barnett had said all along, and was the official reason for the Sharks' two negotiatiors' abstentions. but it didn't matter, Barnett recognized it for what it was - an order by the rest of the owners for him to press the Union HARD at the CBA table for a cap & trade program.
but he didn't, and of the seventeen proposals that the Union and the owners have exchanged outside of actual table-in-session, not one by the owners contains any mention of salary cap & trade, or even a luxury tax...
discontent with this fact reached fever pitch as the whole mess of competing interests arose from their collective slumber around noontime... the media core at the Flat Grounds was buzzing with rumors of the Barnett-Harrington negotiatior axis getting pressured or even bumped, and, at 10pm EST, here we are...
there are far more questions than answers now, particularly about the key provisions that Barnett was able to hammer out with the Union at the table, which call for, in review and in summary:
- a large expansion of the Centralized Player Pension Programme, lowering the minimum qualifying service time from 6 years to 2.5 years, increasing average marginal payouts a staggering 31% over the next ten years, and reducing the payout age from 55 or 25 years retired to 50 or 20 years retired. in response to the additional cost of the program, the owners agreed on Monday to a new, steeply progressive Central Revenue Tax, which will raise and centralize an additional estimated USD$67 million starting in 2011
-in accordance with the Union's 4% ownership stake in the ESFL, it will have three voting seats at the January owners' meetings starting in 2011
- a 45% increase in the league minimum salary, currently USD$78000, by 2013, and a 61% increase by 2017, in real terms.
the last tenet is most troubling to smaller market teams, who rely most heavily upon low-salaried role players to keep costs down... for comparison sake, the Ithaca Champions had 42 of 57 players salaried within 133% of the league minimum, that Sharks 12 of 61, and the Amazin' 17 of 59...
no cost-sharing plan was adopted by the owners to account for the increase in minimum salaries that Barnett negotiated into the CBA, and it has led to widespread concern, interest, and anger...
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