Quote: Jukesays "Players wages are a Hot topic and not something I would like to start playing Russian roulette with - Plus, I am one of the few who seems to understand that the whole salary cap management and how contracts work etc. is a lot more complicated than the average Joe on forums/facebook etc. wants to admit
i.e. the "Get rid of him" - "Just buy another player" - "He's injured so take him off the cap" etc. is a lot more complicated than that.
What I would say is that I do know what 2 players at Wigan are on - and so I Have a guess based on length of service/quality and contract timing (i.e. 1 Year ago Gildart would have been at the end of one contract so it would have been relatively undervalued at that point - Whereas his contract will have significantly increased so I work off what I think that may be) to give me an idea.
Squeezing players wages under the SC is an art form in itself hence why even if it is only for Cap purposes naming someone would give more wriggle room even if they don't use it.
In your scenarios below about Bateman & Hastings - if they were to have accepted Wigan's offer then whichever player would qualify under the biggest exemption would be given Marquee -
So if Hastings was offered 225k say then he would only get 75k dispensation and 150k would count
Whereas we could allocate it to Farrell (Guess) on 200k but 125k dispensation would apply and only 75k would count against the cap.
So even though Hastings would be on more money, Farrell would be named as Marquee?
Hope that makes sense?'"
I understand what you’re saying and like to believe I too understand the salary cap regulations quite well. Having been sad enough to read through them a number of times as well as the recent outcome of the sports resolutions tribunal.
But what makes little sense is Wigan’s claims regarding the lack of cap space...
Referring back to my Hastings example we would have needed at least £150k on the cap in the instance where Hastings would be treated as the marquee player. Hastings was not signed, we signed Sammut so would expect there to be some cap space remaining for at least the difference between £150k and what Sammut earns.
Alternatively, if an existing player earning more than £175k was already utilising that marquee spot we would have needed at least £225k cap space in your example. Again, the difference between that and what Sammut is on being left available.
However, I’ve read numerous articles and quotes saying that we’re spending up to the cap. So to me, something doesn’t add up.