We all witnessed first-hand the effects of an enforceable salary cap in the CFL in 2007. The two publicly owned teams that had experience contending with budgets for years found themselves competing against one another for the league's championship for the first time ever in Toronto (even though the Riders were over the cap in 2007 by $50,000).
Now the teeth of the salary cap are being bared and it appears that not only may the Montreal Alouettes be fined an amount double of what they were over -- because the amount exceeds $100,000 -- but they may also be subject to losing their first-round draft choice in next week's CFL draft as part of the penalty.
For the first time in CFL history, roster payrolls are no longer subject to the whims of their private owners and the fluidity of their chequing accounts in Canada. They are an absolute figure that is to be tracked and audited and this process comes as close to guaranteeing a level playing field for all the member clubs as there has ever been in the CFL.
But when it comes to the situation in which the Alouettes find themselves today, you have to wonder whether this rigidity that has been so welcome and sought-after for so long should now be more lenient.
As discovered by reporter David Naylor of the Globe and Mail, the Alouettes were in violation of the cap in large part because of a salary they carried on a player who did not play a single game in 2007: Steve Charbonneau. Apparently Steve, a 10-year CFL veteran, missed last year's entire season because of an illness unrelated to football, which means that the club had no obligation to pay him his salary for the season. In fact, as Steve's illness was discovered during training camp, he could have been cut and his salary, most likely in the six-figure range, would not have counted against the cap at all. The Alouettes may still have been over the line in the sand, but odds are, if they were, they would have been like the Riders where the cash penalty would not be at a two-to-one ratio and it would not cost them a first-round draft pick.
But the Als didn't dump him, and in this same article, CFLPA legal counsel Ed Molstad argued that teams should not be penalized for salaries incurred because of humanitarian considerations, and if the Alouettes kept Charbonneau on the roster so he could continue to receive medical benefits as an employee, as Naylor reported, then they should be lauded for their consideration instead of punished.
But delving into this further, there are a couple of points to consider.
Impact
One, even though he didn't play any games and didn't suffer a football injury, he could have conceivably been put on the nine-game injured reserve list for the first half of the season and not have that half of his salary impact the cap at all. The other observation is, as a 10-year veteran, after the ninth game of the CFL regular season, the Alouettes could have cut Steve and he still would have received his medical benefits up until the first game of this year, effectively reducing his cap number again.
So in my mind they were either hoping he would eventually recover and rejoin the team at some point last season, or... I really have no idea what they were thinking.
If this story sounds eerily familiar to things that transpired in Bomberland in '07, it probably should. The team had to contend with the non-football-related illness of starting centre Obi Khan for most of the season last year, but continued to pay him his full salary as he dealt with a condition that was outside of the sphere of football and for which they weren't responsible.
If our team had been over the cap in 2007, the same argument and excuse could have been made on his and our behalf. The thing is, we weren't, and we still handled a very similar situation to the Als in terms of circumstance and salary without exceeding the cap.
So should their scenario be weighed any differently?
Even though an enforceable salary cap that levelled the playing field for all the clubs in 2007 was a long-overdue necessity for the CFL, how far do we go to excuse teams that violate the rules under exceptional circumstances while at the same time not eroding the integrity of the salary-management system?
Doug Brown, always a hard-hitting defensive lineman and frequently a hard-hitting columnist, appears Tuesdays in the Free Press.
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