THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1996, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: Thursday, September 19, 1996 TAG: 9609190545
SECTION: SPORTS PAGE: C4 EDITION: FINAL
TYPE: Opinion
SOURCE: BY JIM DUCIBELLA, STAFF WRITER
LENGTH: 96 lines
It's the biggest mystery in sports. Where are the NFL's young, superstar quarterback prospects? How is it that the most glamorous, most lucrative position in all athletics has few, if any, fledgling pros who display Hall-of-Fame potential?
Drew Bledsoe? One great season, particularly followed by a bad year, does not a career make.
Rick Mirer? You mean the frequently-benched guy who's the only quarterback in the AFC without a touchdown pass this season?
Heath Shuler? Trent Dilfer? Dave Brown?
OK, Brett Favre. Maybe you don't realize it because of the way he has ``burst'' onto the national scene, but Favre will be 27 next month. This is his sixth season of pro ball.
Which is precisely the point. Even superstars need time to develop at quarterback, something NFL teams should know.
And if they know, why do they legislate against their future health and well-being by using the salary cap to put time and money restrictions on their most precious commodity?
Consider the Redskins. Unless Gus Frerotte gets hurt or is turned into a pillar of salt, Shuler figures to spend the season watching from the sidelines and $1.452 million will count against Washington's salary cap. Next year, when that figure more than doubles, there's no way for Shuler to remain a Redskin.
If Frerotte is even average, what choice do the Redskins have but to let Shuler, who will be a restricted free agent, find a deal elsewhere? They can't afford a $3.6 million clipboard carrier.
What's wrong about it is that Frerotte is only marginally better than Shuler. And that's right now, this minute. You can find NFL personnel people who still feel that Shuler has a better future.
The Redskins - and every other team that has faced a similar circumstance - would be able to fully develop potential star quarterbacks if the league altered the salary-cap system to include a ``wildcard'' player.
Here's how it would work:
Each team would be allowed to declare one of its quarterbacks, starter or not, a wildcard. For his first five seasons, his salary and incentive clauses would be prorated against the cap.
The first season, only 10 percent of salary and incentive clauses would count. The second year, 20 percent. The third, 30 percent, and so forth. Starting with the sixth season, 100 percent of the quarterback's salary and incentives would count.
Teams with established star quarterbacks with more than five years experience would be allowed to place any draft pick into this category.
When Dallas eventually drafted a quarterback to replace Troy Aikman, the Cowboys would have the option of changing their ``wildcard'' pick. However, no team could wildcard a veteran free-agent quarterback they signed because the rule is designed to help develop quarterbacks.
A slow-learning quarterback's salary wouldn't be an albatross around a team's neck. Time and energy spent training a player wouldn't be tossed aside for reasons other than his inability to play.
How would the salary cap have affected three of this era's best quarterbacks - Aikman, Pittsburgh's Terry Bradshaw and San Francisco's Steve Young? It's a valid comparison.
Bradshaw was the first player picked in the 1970 draft. Aikman was the first player picked in the '89 draft. Young was chosen in the first round of the '84 supplemental draft by Tampa Bay, then dealt to San Francisco for two high picks. Big-bucks guys, all three.
Bradshaw's quarterback ratings his first three seasons were 30.6, 59.8 and 64.1. He then retreated back into the 50s his next two seasons before hitting 87.8 his sixth season.
Pittsburgh's record in Bradshaw's first three seasons: 22-20. Hardly stellar.
Aikman's Cowboys were 14-24 after his first three seasons. He threw 31 touchdown passes, but was intercepted 46 times and sacked 80 times.
Young cut his teeth for two seasons in the USFL before coming to the 49ers in 1987. Granted, he was stuck behind Joe Montana, but in Young's first four seasons in San Francisco, he attempted just 69, 101, 92 and 62 passes.
What happens to those three players if, like Shuler, they each carried a cap salary of $1.425 million?
Maybe the tightwad Steelers decide they can't wait any longer for Bradshaw to develop and dump him for Terry Hanratty or Joe Gilliam, both of whom had more than their share of moments.
Maybe the Cowboys decide they'd rather have lower-priced Steve Walsh instead of a guy who's had one-third more interceptions than touchdowns.
The 49ers definitely don't keep Young, not with Montana in his prime and earning megabucks. When he became a restricted free agent at the end of his third season, Young would be asked to make a deal with another team.
Think NFL history would be different?
This is Shuler's third season. Under the wildcard plan, his cap number would be 30 percent of his salary and incentives, or $435,600. Frerotte could still be the team's starter, Shuler could still be Washington's work in progress. Would pressure have mounted for him to prove his worth? You bet. Would he still have time to prove himself in Washington? Yeah.
How many other quarterbacks, forced into the starting lineup before they were ready, would this system have benefited? Maybe none. But many of the game's greatest quarterbacks sat, watched, waited and learned at a time when the game wasn't nearly as complicated as it is today.
It's only time and money. The NFL can spare a little of both to improve its product. by CNB