The players are indeed guaranteed 57% of the share of HRR. Not more and not less. (from the CBA itself: The dollar amount represented by the Players' Share in a League Year (i.e., Leaguewide Player Compensation) shall equal (i.e., shall never exceed nor be less than) the Applicable Percentage of HRR, as calculated pursuant to this Article 50). Escrow isn't about clawing money from the players it's the mechanism in which they are guaranteed their share.ESQ wrote: Under the "linkage" system, as more and more teams spend at the floor instead of the ceiling, the players aren't getting their 57%. By my math on capgeek they're barely over 50% of the reported league revenues of $3.3 billion. The players want to get closer to their linkage amount by encouraging spending by the weaker franchises, while capping the amount of the raises in the cap floor. I suspect this is going to be a very attractive prospect to the multitude of cap floor owners, because even under the League's proposal there is still potential for huge jumps in the cap floor if revenues continue to grow at 7-8%.
How does cap geek give you the different numbers? I think the following:
1) the players share is not calculated through the cap hit but rather the actual yearly salary that is paid out. For example, Luongo's contribution of salary to the calculation if not the $5.25 mil cap hit but the $6.7 mil he was actually paid.
2) that 57% share also includes other player related costs such as health insurance, per diems, required payments for relocation etc
3) injury call ups get paid and contribute to that 57% and may not be accurately captured just by looking at cap geek.
4) As Gilman has said...they aren't always right