Why No Trading Of Players Between Teams?

Ravs

Ravs

Well-known member
In North American sports, the trading of players between teams is a matter of course and the players involved do not get much, if any, say in the matter. Alternatively in English football, it looks as though the trading of players between teams is not allowed. Curious as to the reasons why…
 
I've often wondered this. There are agents involved just like over here, and if anything you'd think it would be harder in USA due to the size of the place.

Also, i have often wondered why we rarely see many player plus cash deals anymore, i feel like we seen them alot but now not so much. If we're signing Gyokeres, can't we offer 8m and Watmore, or 9m and Coburn for the season; If we want O'hare what about 5m plus Boyd-Munce for the season, that sort of thing. Too many moving parts and players having too much power so they can simply say they're not interested in moving even when they can clearly see a player is being brought in to replace them.
 
They don't use cash in their transfer system, do they?

I'm fascinated by the use of draft picks as a pseudo-currency, but it could never work in Europe.

Swap deal do happen occasionally, but they're rarer. I assume it's because players have more control over their own contracts than in US sport.
 
Swaps and player plus cash do still happen but a lot is about ego as no player wants to be the player in the player plus cash deal so you’ll see words used like

And going the other way

or

as part of the deal etc

used instead they make out it’s another deal when in reality every knows it’s not.
 
Ravs said:
In North American sports, the trading of players between teams is a matter of course and the players involved do not get much, if any, say in the matter. Alternatively in English football, it looks as though the trading of players between teams is not allowed. Curious as to the reasons why…
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North American sports well the big ones are also closed markets as well so they only really have one option when it comes to trades. Their is no nfl rival or even an mlb nba ( at that level of funding) so trades make more sense as it’s so insular.
 
Jedi boro said:
Swaps and player plus cash do still happen but a lot is about ego as no player wants to be the player in the player plus cash deal so you’ll see words used like

And going the other way

or

as part of the deal etc

used instead they make out it’s another deal when in reality every knows it’s not.
Click to expand...
Like historically Derek Whyte and Chris Morris coming from Celtic in exchange for Andy Payton.
 
Probably part of the reason is that there's no real financial advantages in the NFL on a club basis. They all take essentially the same amount of money from the league, with a few exceptions like luxury boxes, though they really aren't enough to make a great deal of difference. So it's unlikely that say Jacksonville would trade with Dallas because they're desperate for $50m to build a new stand. But draft picks give you a competitive advantage.

It is of course a closed league, which is the main thing really. Tom Brady can't go play in the Italian equivalent because there isn't one.
 
US is most free market country in the world, yet the guiding principles of their sports is a very communist based system. Everything is centrally owned and then shared out to the teams equally and the worst teams get to pick the best players next year to try and even it up.

I am always suprised that their newspapers / talk show hosts who rant about anything perceived to be left wing don't make more of it.
 
I think modern football transfers are difficult enough to arrange as it is, and any swap or trade deal makes things even more awkward. You have 2 sets of agents, 2 players and 2 clubs to negotiate with and keep happy. You might spend a long time negotiating and getting one set of them happy only for an agent for the other players to pull the plug because of wages or some contract clause, and you have then wasted a huge amount of time. Imagine that happening with a transfer deadline looming.

I think Tony Pulis was asked about this a few years ago, and said something similar. I cant remember exactly which transfer he was asked about.

Practically speaking it is best to keep any such deals separate, even if that means I pay you £1m for one player and you then pay me £1.5m for a different player going in the opposite direction.
 
Steer said:
I think modern football transfers are difficult enough to arrange as it is, and any swap or trade deal makes things even more awkward. You have 2 sets of agents, 2 players and 2 clubs to negotiate with and keep happy. You might spend a long time negotiating and getting one set of them happy only for an agent for the other players to pull the plug because of wages or some contract clause, and you have then wasted a huge amount of time. Imagine that happening with a transfer deadline looming.

I think Tony Pulis was asked about this a few years ago, and said something similar. I cant remember exactly which transfer he was asked about.

Practically speaking it is best to keep any such deals separate, even if that means I pay you £1m for one player and you then pay me £1.5m for a different player going in the opposite direction.
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The makeweight player would have too much leverage because they can scupper the main deal. Far easier to keep them separate.

junos_boots said:
US is most free market country in the world, yet the guiding principles of their sports is a very communist based system. Everything is centrally owned and then shared out to the teams equally and the worst teams get to pick the best players next year to try and even it up.

I am always suprised that their newspapers / talk show hosts who rant about anything perceived to be left wing don't make more of it.
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It's as capitalist a system as you can get. You are making the mistake of thinking that the sport is the important thing but it is the money that matters. It's a cartel to guarantee massive profits for the owners. They don't care about the sport itself. If they had to compete financially with each other then they'd spend way more (for the same revenue) so instead they have a fixed system where they get to keep all the profit.
 
Nano said:
The makeweight player would have too much leverage because they can scupper the main deal. Far easier to keep them separate.


It's as capitalist a system as you can get. You are making the mistake of thinking that the sport is the important thing but it is the money that matters. It's a cartel to guarantee massive profits for the owners. They don't care about the sport itself. If they had to compete financially with each other then they'd spend way more (for the same revenue) so instead they have a fixed system where they get to keep all the profit.
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I think you are probably right in why they don't try to change it but I think when the system was set up (not that long ago) the sport was probably the most important part.
 
fmttmadmin said:
Like historically Derek Whyte and Chris Morris coming from Celtic in exchange for Andy Payton.
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Yes, but they were actually published figures; Whyte was 900k and Morris 100K.

I think it was convenient to say that it was a swap at the time, but I can't imagine that contracts are that simple whereas they just rip up old contracts and head off to their new clubs.
 
I find the draft thing fascinating. Yes, I know little to nothing about it so hopefully someone with some knowledge can jump in best young players (I'm thinking NBA, not sure if other sports do it) you see these kids at home with the caps or 'jerseys' of every team in the league in front of them, and then its announced who has picked them and they pick up that cap, that shirt, and jump around... SO you may live in Texas, and you can be picked by either a team from LA, or NYC? You have no say, you just have to go wherever you're told? Why don't we have a national football school or some college/school system and when you turn 15/16, the best 20 kids in the country (decided by the FA?) could all get drafted to a Premier league side one at a time - i can see that happening - I know clubs grab these players alot younger than 15/16 but just for arguments sake i had to pick an age.

You also see teams trading their draft positions, so a team with the first pick will swap for 10th pick, there must be financial purposes for that?
 
Guaranteed contracts backed by the leagues and salary caps.

(This is NBA, I don’t know much about the others but it’s pretty much the same.)

So you’ll see a player who’s underachieving but being paid a fortune - let’s call him Harry Maguire - being traded for three young players who don’t earn much because they’re still on their rookie deal, which is guaranteed and can’t be changed until it expires, plus some draft picks, which again are guaranteed by the league.

You’ll have bad teams who know they’re bad, who are happy to pick up bad contracts, because being bad means you finish lower = better draft picks. So you’ll get dreadful teams with too much salary - let’s call them Everton - who will deliberately bring in bad, highly paid players if they get some draft picks as well, because their plan is to be awful for a few years, get the best draft picks, then build a team to be good in 5-7 years.

Difference with football is nobody can leave their contract. There’s no “transfer” system, you can’t buy someone else’s player. You sign for four years with a team, you’re stuck to that contract - but another club can pick up that contract, that’s where trades come in, but again all depends if you can both fit it into your salary cap. You have to swap a similar contract back.

Which is the same cap for every team in the league - if you go over it, you pay something like 4x the amount per million in tax to the league, so if you’re 1m in salary over, you give the league 4m to compensate for it. 3m, you give them 12m, etc.
 
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VestasBoro said:
I find the draft thing fascinating. Yes, I know little to nothing about it so hopefully someone with some knowledge can jump in best young players (I'm thinking NBA, not sure if other sports do it) you see these kids at home with the caps or 'jerseys' of every team in the league in front of them, and then its announced who has picked them and they pick up that cap, that shirt, and jump around... SO you may live in Texas, and you can be picked by either a team from LA, or NYC? You have no say, you just have to go wherever you're told? Why don't we have a national football school or some college/school system and when you turn 15/16, the best 20 kids in the country (decided by the FA?) could all get drafted to a Premier league side one at a time - i can see that happening - I know clubs grab these players alot younger than 15/16 but just for arguments sake i had to pick an age.

You also see teams trading their draft positions, so a team with the first pick will swap for 10th pick, there must be financial purposes for that?
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Yes, they have no choice at all. The worst teams get the best players in the draft. And, lock them into a four year contract on minimal money (a rookie contract) so they have to stay with that team.

Socialism!

There is a lottery every season in NBA for draft picks, the worst 10 teams are in it and there’s varying odds, but basically the worst 3 teams always get the best 3 players from the draft.

It’s still competitive in its way in positions like from 5-15, players will try out privately for different teams and there’s a thing called the combine, where all the draft prospects do a day of athletic skills - literally, jump as high as you can, do some weights, do some sprints - and teams can change their mind depending on that. But players can’t turn down a team; they’ll be on the same wage regardless.
 
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