"Here you go Goodesy, we were going to give you $631,400 but you're now getting $700,000 due to the extra allowance!"

They can present it to the AFL whatever they want. Unless a player is on base payments, its impossible to track.

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Looking forward to seeing our potential realised.

I think it would be easy to track if it is done correctly. They have a salary cap like everyone else and every player fits into the salary cap, then a separate allowance of 9.8% gets added to the salary of each player. For example Kurt Tippett gets $800,000 a season, salary cap component $721,600, allowance $78,400.
This is what needs to be clarified.

I don't really like the idea of Swanny commenting on it to the media, but he's got a right to do so, regardless of what Colless might think.

If Sydney wanted this to get off the agenda, they would agree that the extra % should be divided up between players on their first contracts in the league (i.e. 1st to 3rd year players), and any player under the league average. It would be a set % additional to the contract amount signed and would fluctuate according to how many players on the list and any given point would fall within its bounds. I can't see how players on an above average AFL wage can truly have major hurdles with cost of living, particularly given the job that Sydney do promoting the location and club culture.

Fact is the perception is that Sydney have it as their (not so) little treasure chest they can tap in to as and when they please. And as for GWS comments about raising it... please. It was all fun and games having 8,000 first round picks, not so much fun when you've got some competition for signing them.

Actually when you look at the Tippett scenario I do have a problem with the allowance.
Let's say Gary Rohan lives in the same suburb as Kurt Tippett and both are renting, single etc. etc. Gary Rohan is on $300,000 a season which = salary cap $270,600 plus allowance $29,400 and Kurt Tippett is on $800,000 which equals $721,600 salary cap and $79,400 allowance. Players get paid differently based on ability, position etc. etc. but why should Tippett get an extra $50,000 allowance to live in the same place and under similar circusmstances as Gary Rohan?

I think everyone knows the COL allowance is nothing more than assistance to a strategically important club, and in having a crack at our CEO the Swans are doing nothing more than protecting their own position. You'd expect nothing less, and in the same position I'd be expecting Swann to do the same.

Hard to believe this is even a story, to be honest.

I keep telling my boss in Adelaide that I should get extra salary for living in sydney - He doesnt listen for some reason

It is more expensive up here but FMD we are not talking about people on minimum wage are we

I don't have any issue if they are all fitted under the cap of everyone else then the % added to every player but you could put an arguement forward for perth as well- and conversely Adelaides cap should be less

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If you allow the Government to change the Laws in an emergency
They will create an Emergency to change the Laws

So for Tippett, that's an extra $90k per year. Do the math. If that covers the more expensive rent in Sydney, he's paying about $11k per week in rent.
I didn't know that Kiribilli was for lease. Julia has to find some way to pay for the surplus

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T E A M

It can still be manipulated by those that are organising the contracts, they probably did that from day one. Regardless, no matter how much a club offers a player, if the Swans say 'we can beat that by 9.8%', that giving them an unnatural advantage.

I usually agree with what you have to say but with this one, I think you are talking BS.

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Just because I'm offended, doesn't mean I'm wrong.

Reckon they should just be completely honest and have a salary cap increase for the non-AFL states to encourage the game to grow in those regions (Sydney and QLD).

This is probably vengence for Visy not being able to pay what they want to Juddy and the rest. (Don't see how a third party paying players threatens the financial position of the club. Probably strengthens it.

wondering if that is published anywhere official?

Imo, there shouldnt be a cost of living adjustment for the sydney teams as it is completely artificial. Not that sydney isnt expensive, but that the cost of living varies across all capital cities - if you are to make a cost of living adjustment for sydney, then the AFL should really be implementing similar adjustments for teams in WA, SA and QLD.

A cost of living adjustment should also be limited to those that actually need it ie those at the bottom end of the list (rookies/draftees/1st 'real' contract). That would cover most players through their first 4-5 yrs on an AFL list.

4-5 yrs on an AFL list should be sufficient for players to have established themselves in a city and for the cost of living difference b/n cities to have no real impact from there on in. I dont think that it is unreasonable to suggest that by yr 6, players would be earning in excess of 200k/yr (with most earning a lot more than that) - on that level of $$, you dont need a cost of living allowance and very few players will choose to leave due to sydney having a higher cost of living...

so player 42 on the list is getting $100,000 regardless. What the allowance lets the Swans do is pay him $90k out of the salary cap and $10k out of the higher living allowance. Without the allowance, he wouldn't be getting $90k

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"The ability to speak doesn't make you intelligent." Qui-Gon Jinn 15-05-2005

"there’s more chance of me becoming the full forward for the [Western Bulldogs] than there is of any change in the Labor Party." Julia Gillard 18-05-2010

It's a sham they just take total remuneration and present it as 9.8% om top. I.e. rookie kid you get 90k present to AFL as 90k/1.089 =82644 plus 8.9%.
9% on your cap is good coin, especially when since our penalties roughly half the flags have been won by teams with AFL sanctioned TPP overs, Brisbane 3 and Sydney 2. We lost 1 mill and genuine picks 1 and 2 and they get flags yep seems fair. Sure there's more to it like administrative competence I mean we finished last being a mill over the cap but nobody says our spoon was tainted.

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Green Shooter

Close thread, Sydney apologised to Sticks via a phone "conversation".
http://www.theage.com.au/afl/afl-news/s ... 2fgyj.html

Damn !! I was hoping Colless would flip Sticks the bird. Y'know like he did Eddie.

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The problem with Socialism is, you eventually run out of other people's money.

What staggers me is that the other AFL clubs don't know how the cost of living allowance works. Geelong president Carter, who is an ex commissioner says the allowance needs to be spread evenly amongst all players, even he does not know how it works. If I was an executive at a club and I was giving a competitior an advantage I would think the very least you could do is understand how the allowance works. It's a bit late asking questions when they have have just won a flag and recruited a big name player.

What staggers me is other clubs giving two hoots about what another club does or doesn't get. Swann (Coll), Ablett (GC) and Judd are all on similar deals whereby some of their additional services agreement money is funneled into their respective club's injury payments...the AFL approved these payment structures. I don't hear too many club complaints about that one....nor others.

I don't think it works at all as simply adding 9.8% to each players wage. Its just an extra 9.8% they can spend as they wish. How else could they get that much in their cap so easily for Tippett?

Its rubbish and should be stopped. Regardless of how and who raised the issue, at its heart, its simply unfair that clubs are allowed significant additional allowances on the one measure that is supposed to even the competition. And if you agree with a 'cost of living' allowance, then ok, lets have discounts for Adelaide/Port and increases for Perth and Fremantle.

As I've said, in the next 5 years we will lose a final against a club who has this advantage, just as Collingwood and Essendon* did against Brisbane in the early 00's. And it won't be as funny as we think then.

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Everything before the word "but" is horseshit - J Snow

So, clubs are just meant to sit back and accept advantages to other clubs....righto

Question, in American sports, does a New York team receive extra living allowances in their salary caps over some club in a less expensive town to live in?

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"I will rejoice in their anguish, delight in their failure and revel in our success"

We are Carlton, @#$%&! the rest !!!!!!

I don't like this cost of living bullshit, I think that comparing the difference in salaries for the same occupations in Melbourne and Sydney would be a better way of judging if there should be any difference in caps between the NSW teams and the rest of the comp.

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We are the maybe blues

You have to break it down by league as each has very different CBA's. In the NBA and MLB for example, they have a luxury tax which means that a team is allowed to pay over and above the salary cap to a certain point, but beyond this the team will be forced to pay a fine (or a 'luxury tax') to the governing body.

That example is thought to not work here for a variety reasons - namely because we don't have owners and there'd be massive disparity if Bruce Mathieson said 'fine - go over the cap, just use 10% of pokie revenue to pay the luxury tax' and North Melbourne said 'We can't afford to pay the luxury tax'...

The New York Yankees have paid luxury tax for the last decade. Over $20million in luxury tax this year alone. The Pittsburgh Pirates never pay the tax because they have a smaller market, smaller revenue and therefore smaller payroll. The Yankees earned $427 million in revenue last year, the Pirates earned $160 million. It's that gap that MLB hope to bridge by using the luxury tax. The New York Yankees pay at a rate of 40% on the amount of their payroll over $178 million.

The money generated from the luxury tax in the MLB is not distributed to the rest of the league, as is the case with the NBA, but rather is used for other purposes. The first $5 million is withheld to cover potential refunds, and is contributed to the Industry Growth Fund (IGF) if no refunds are forthcoming. The remaining money is divided as follows: 50% funds player benefits, 25% funds developing baseball in countries without high school baseball, and 25% goes to the IGF.

You could tinker with the MLB model and come up with something that might work for the AFL. But US Sports franchises don't whinge and whine like Australian ones do. Much of it is media driven but FFS - take care of your own backyard. If the AFL want to continue to look after a non-traditional football market like they've been doing since they completely dropped the ball in the early-mid 90's - let them. No one has presented me an argument as to why it harms their club. I'd like Carlton to fix Carlton's problems first.