AFL stars accused of greed

[Magpietothemax]

These young guys are totally adrift, and are not to blame. We need to blame the political elite. How can you expect young, AFL footballers to be responsible when the likes of Scott Morrson declare that even though we should obey social distancing, school teachers are still being forced to teach their students with 27 packed into a single classroom? How can you condemn Biclavs, when Morrison is giving $100000 to small businesses who can keep employing staff, regardless of social distancing requirements? How do you expect afl footballers, young men, to understand the seriousness of the current situation, when the political elite, Liberal and Labor alike, are confusing them with incredibly mixed messages about what they need to do right now?
The AFL players should absolutely demand everything that they were promised by the AFL. They are not "greedy". This is the self serving propaganda of the AFL bureaucracy, who live lives of luxury as a result of the blood, sweat and tears of the AFL players. These young guys are absolutely entilted to their full salary. They put their bodies on the line,week after week, and the AFL has gorged itself on the resulting profits.

[What'sinaname]

The AFLW players have been very quiet during all of this. I wonder if they are hoping they'll continue to get their 10% pay rise in 2021 and 11% in 2022...after their 20% pay rise this year?

[Mr Miyagi]

[What'sinaname]

AFLW are disgusting. I hate that they haven't said boo about trying to help the AFL in cost cutting.

Selfish, selfish, selfish.

[K]

Caro:

AFL players lack leadership as tough times hit

https://www.theage.com.au/sport/afl/afl-players-lack-leadership-as-tough-times-hit-20200327-p54emm.html

"Perhaps it is more accurate to say the entire game has existed in a bubble of all of our making. But once the AFL's season was called off, the bubble well and truly burst and after close to 80 per cent of the game's workforce was sent home the narrative focused upon the players and their refusal to act quickly to make sacrifices to save the game.

From Gillon McLachlan down, the competition attempted to suggest the acrimony was exaggerated.

On Channel Nine on Wednesday night Collingwood's AFLPA delegate Mason Cox pointed his finger at the media and president Eddie McGuire backed him up, suggesting the reporting pack without games to talk about needed a story.

There was a good reason for all these denials. The last thing AFL bosses, club presidents and players need is for the financially brutalised football-loving public to fall out of love with the stars who put on the show.
...

And not helped by Tom Rockliff's lament about his investment property, Patrick Dangerfield's urge for industrial clarity when everything else about our lives has become so clouded.
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The game's highest-paid coach Alastair Clarkson was initially resistant to the concept last week when the coaches agreed via a series of text messages to volunteer a wage reduction. He wondered whether such a move was unnecessary grandstanding. But Clarkson came to the party after Nathan Buckley pointed out that showing leadership was important.
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Clubs have been told to expect to operate next season with playing lists of 35 and down to 30 by season 2022. At least $3 million will be stripped from football departments and there is the very real prospect of no 2020 national draft.
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If the draft age - and significantly fewer players will be drafted in the coming years - was raised to 19 or even 20 then then players would enter the game more mature, more resilient and boasting more skills to cope with life later."

[K]

The 50 and 70 per cent solution - AFL and players agree on pay cut

https://www.theage.com.au/sport/afl/afl-and-players-close-to-deal-on-pay-cuts-20200327-p54eks.html

"The AFL and the league's players have reached an agreement on a pay-cut deal that will lead to the players losing 50 per cent over the next eight weeks and then either 70 per cent or 50 per cent for the remainder of the season.

The players will lose 70 per cent of their pay for the period after May 31 if the games are not played. They will receive 50 per cent only in the event that games are played and this will not change, regardless of whether crowds are permitted at games later this season.
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AFL boss Gillon McLachlan, who led the negotiations with AFLPA chief executive Paul Marsh, is understood to be taking the same pay cut this year as the players, who have been paid the first five months of their 12-month contracts. McLachlan made this undertaking during the discussions with Paul Marsh, the AFLPA chief executive.
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The AFL, while having differences of opinion with the players, still took the view that the players were entitled to negotiate a pay cut rather than just accept the AFL's terms."

[qldmagpie67]

All sports are being impacted by this simply because the TV revenue isn’t coming in
The players have rights and what seems to be missed in this by many media outlets scrambling to get a headline is in every contract there are clauses that allow for adjustments for catastrophe
I’ve spent the past week assisting my former employer with how we budgeted prior to the super TV right deals being the norm
Simply put we didn’t have the players basically having to be spoon fed every time they turned the heads
Players pervious actually did things around clubs to assist in there own well-being
I remember players cooking BBQ after training for teammates for there lunch now it’s catered to suit everyone’s individual wants and desires
Players cleaned there own locker rooms and took rubbish to bins
Players picked up training aids and took them back to storage
Money has made these players rich and saved many clubs but it’s come with a sense of entitlement for many

I’ll leave you with this thought now
At the Brisbane broncos there is a current player viewed as a once in a generation player. Offers have come in form just about every club in the league for his services. He’s held off on making a decision other than he wants to stay in Queensland but will still command around $1 million a season and he’s yet to turn 20!! ( JDG & Moore may now be easier to sign than if we were playing)
Right now the money has dried up because clubs don’t know what is going to happen going forward and this includes the money coming from TV rights as it can all be renegotiated now because from a broadcasters point of view the contract has been breached therefore is now null and void
I expect there will be a adjustment in the market place in TV deals as channel 7&9 are both cash strapped prior to this and Fox has been losing massive amounts of money for years
The only upside for AFL and league it has received massive exposure (be it short term) in the American market and it’s now likely ESPN will want international broadcast rights currently held by Fox

Spending will now be reviewed at every club all cost centres broken down and scrutinised
Players salaries will also be in for a adjustment
I believe the TV deals will likely decrease by around 15-25% as the broadcasters aren’t getting the high end revenue for advertising during games because there’s no games
Broadcasters now have the opportunity to look over the return on investment model again and it’s likely they won’t be prepared to outbid a rival and drive up the TV rights for sports it will be a much more equity based model

[K]

Gleason:

How will AFL player pay cuts work – and will they change the game?

https://www.theage.com.au/sport/afl/how-will-afl-player-pay-cuts-work-and-will-they-change-the-game-20200401-p54fzz.html

[Hiss]

I continue to say that the greed of so many involved in AFL has now seen us on the brink in this time of reckoning! Players salaries are unsustainable and must be completely reviewed. It is disgusting greed at its worst ! No one should donate membership money until some urgent changes are made to cut salaries and profit expectations of the corporate greed. Players must give more like the rest of us . A 50 or 75% cut to a minimum $200 k salary is better than the Centrelink handout millions of Australians are now receiving. And let’s not forget many AFL players are earning millions. Spare me the crocodile tears. Our game now must reverse engineer to a purely membership focussed game. Not one that has seen individual corporate ego, power, and greed masked by a media trying to crap on to us about the smoke and mirrors and now some people outrageously trying to tug on our heart strings.

[Mr Miyagi]

How the hell are players earning less than $142,000 eligible for JobKeeper?!?! Even with the 30% pay cut, they’re still pocketing up to $100k!!!!! I lost my job and I’m not f***ing eligible because my ex-employer hasn’t lost more than 50% of their revenue. All I get is $550 Centrelink and an uphill battle to get a new job — and I was only earning $49k!!!!

[Uncle Jack]

[think positive]

way to miss the point.

if those players claim that benefit, then this truly is a joke of a country. bloody disgusting.

[K]

[Pies4shaw]

[Pies4shaw]

To put this clearly: if, hypothetically speaking, I am a footballer who used to be paid $500,000 and I have agreed to receive $250,000 for a period, I probably have massive finance commitments (eg, on housing loans and possibly my Ferrari), so although my income looks huge to someone on $49K, I don’t actually have much disposable income because it is largely spoken for and goes on commitments I have to purchase assets at prices I can’t realise (because, eg, the secondhand Ferrari market isn’t too solid these days). In fact, I might be living hand to mouth, given my commitments. The footballers who have taken massive salary cuts will be doing it very tough - it just doesn’t look like it because the majority of people can’t imagine doing it tough on such salaries. Of course, that would be correct in normal times - but these are not such times.