R. C. Owens and free agency

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StewThornley
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R. C. Owens and free agency

Post by StewThornley »

Howdy. Long-time member, first-time caller. I’m working on an article for the Coffin Corner that will probably result in lots of questions, but I’ll do only a few at a time. My understanding is that in 1947 the NFL changed its reserve clause from a perpetual reserve rule (meaning it could renew a player’s contract into perpetuity) to a one-year option rule, which allowed a player to play out his option.

Why would the NFL do this? It wasn’t in the interest of the teams, so what prompted them to make it a one-time-only option to renew a player’s contract?

Why did it take 15 years for a player, R. C. Owens, to play out his option? Were players unaware of their power to do so? Was there collusion by NFL owners to not sign free agents? Had others played out their option with no takers?

We’re there others who did so but not sign with another NFL team? Bud Grant played out his option with the Eagles in 1952 and signed with the Winnipeg. I take it that no indemnity from Winnipeg to Philadelphia was needed (the same as when Owens signed with Baltimore in 1962, since this was before the Rozelle Rule).

I’m going to have more questions about CFL-NFL transfers, such as when the Vikings got Joe Kapp in 1967, but I’ll stick to Owens for now.

I read Joseph Hession’s article on Owens in the Coffin Corner, which was very interesting about the alley-oop pass. Somewhere else in the Coffin Corner (can’t find it right now) was an article on spiking field goals, something Owens reportedly did until the league outlawed goaltending. Can anyone point me to that article? Or tell me more about Owens doing it. Wikipedia says he did it but that the NFL outlawed goaltending on field-goal attempts the next year. It has no dates for this. And I know Owens wasn’t the only player to do this. I’d appreciate any insights others have on this.

I went through San Francisco papers when Owens became a free agent. They kept mentioning a big package the Oakland Raiders were offering and that Montreal in the CFL was interested. Owens signed with Baltimore, reportedly for $17,000. I’m not sure how that compared with other salaries. Owens didn’t have good years with the Colts. What happened? Was his 1961 season an anomaly?

Thanks for anything anyone can provide. I’ll hang up and listen.

Stew Thornley
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GameBeforeTheMoney
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Re: R. C. Owens and free agency

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From what people have told me, you could play out your option with a pay cut -- maybe 10%. So, you'd make less than you did the previous season and risk injury but then you would become a free agent. There was quite a bit of risk involved.
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RRMarshall
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Re: R. C. Owens and free agency

Post by RRMarshall »

In the AFL Pete Gogolak did not sign after his rookie season of 1964 and played the entire 1965 season with a 10% pay cut but did become a free agent after that season. He expected to get a hefty raise from another AFL team, but he did not realize there was a Gentlemen's Agreement between AFL owners not to sign any players that played out their options. Perhaps there was a similar understanding in the NFL at the time. As we all know the NY Giants signed Gogolak to a huge contract and the damn broke with the AFL raiding the NFL's players.
Jay Z
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Re: R. C. Owens and free agency

Post by Jay Z »

I don't know why they changed the contract in 1947. They had to deal with the AAFC and the CFL and may have felt they couldn't back it up, was going to be ignored by the other leagues anyway, and just lead to a lawsuit. The NFL never had the sort of traditionalism treatment that baseball did by Congress and the courts.

As far as the CFL/NFL, it varied. Tobin Rote was an option playout when he left the Lions for Canada. Ernie Warlick was coming back the other way. Cookie Gilchrist and Joe Kapp were not option playouts. Usually if the CFL player made enough of a stink they could get released and not have to play out the option. This was enabled by the CFL season starting so much earlier. Just don't show up, and the team will release you in time to sign with a USA team.

Going the other way, to Canada, I think there were some like Mac Speedie that did not bother to play out their option. Not as well versed there, but I think they got away with it most of the time.

Willard Dewveall went from NFL to AFL before Gogolak and Owens. He was an option playout. It was treated as a one-off. Art Powell and Ernie Ladd were the only two intra-AFL option playouts. Powell did have some NFL interest.
StewThornley
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Re: R. C. Owens and free agency

Post by StewThornley »

Thanks for the insights - and keep them coming. Jay Z, thanks esp. for the stuff on Kapp. I went back to the Minneapolis papers when he was acquired by the Vikings. There had been some mention of him being in the process of playing out his option with BC (or Vancouver, as the paper referred to the Lions) and he was in California, not with BC, when the Vikings acquired him. I know it's also been said that Kapp came to the Vikings in the first CFL-NFL trade ever. I'm not sure what the real scoop is on how he came to Minnesota. Anything you could add to that is appreciated. (Trades/playing out option and signing as free agent is always dicey. Besides the four players Rozelle sent compensation for, there were a lot of players who signed with other teams with the teams working out their compensation on their own. I think that happened when Lonnie Warwick went from Minnesota to Atlanta, and I think that's what happened with Kapp going from the Vikings to Boston.) I know the baseball reserve clause/free agency situation much better, and maybe it's not a good comparison to what happened in football. Thanks.
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Bryan
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Re: R. C. Owens and free agency

Post by Bryan »

StewThornley wrote:Thanks for the insights - and keep them coming. Jay Z, thanks esp. for the stuff on Kapp. I went back to the Minneapolis papers when he was acquired by the Vikings. There had been some mention of him being in the process of playing out his option with BC (or Vancouver, as the paper referred to the Lions) and he was in California, not with BC, when the Vikings acquired him. I know it's also been said that Kapp came to the Vikings in the first CFL-NFL trade ever. I'm not sure what the real scoop is on how he came to Minnesota. Anything you could add to that is appreciated. (Trades/playing out option and signing as free agent is always dicey. Besides the four players Rozelle sent compensation for, there were a lot of players who signed with other teams with the teams working out their compensation on their own. I think that happened when Lonnie Warwick went from Minnesota to Atlanta, and I think that's what happened with Kapp going from the Vikings to Boston.) I know the baseball reserve clause/free agency situation much better, and maybe it's not a good comparison to what happened in football. Thanks.
In 1967, Young was part of a multi-player three-team swap that saw Bill Symons and Dick Fouts go to Toronto from BC, Joe Kapp go to Minnesota and Jim Young come to the BC Lions. Vancouver would be Young’s football home for the next thirteen seasons.

I've read from a couple different sources that the Vikings essentially traded WR Jim Young to BC for Joe Kapp, but there are a couple different versions. Jim Finks and Bud Grant knew of Kapp from their time in the CFL, but I've read different stories as to how the trade was actually consummated. One story is a straight up swap of Kapp for Young. One is a three team trade outlined above. One is Young and Kapp being waived out of their leagues and acquired by their new teams. Either way, the fact that Jim Young is involved is interesting, because he didn't play much for the Vikings but he went on to be a CFL HOF player, despite looking like this:

Image
Brian wolf
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Re: R. C. Owens and free agency

Post by Brian wolf »

I never realized Roman Polanski played football ...
RichardBak
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Re: R. C. Owens and free agency

Post by RichardBak »

Brian wolf wrote:I never realized Roman Polanski played football ...
Yep, he played for the Rosemary Babies (Alberta, Canada) in the old CFL.
StewThornley
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Re: R. C. Owens and free agency

Post by StewThornley »

They had tried to trade Young before. This was an item in the Minneapolis Tribune 11-30-1966: Vikings rumored to be sending Jim Young to BC Lions for halfback Willie Fleming; would be first NFL-CFL trade. BC has to get CFL rights to Young from Toronto; Minnesota has to get NFL rights from Philadelphia.

***

That didn't happen, of course, but it showed the complications involved in inter-league trades. When Kapp signed with Boston in 1970, a Tribune story wrote, "the Vikings got Kapp from Canada. That cost them an indemnity reported at somewhere between $25,000 and $50,000 to get Kapp out of the Canadian Football League, plus a payment to Kapp of $300,000 for three years."

So I'm not sure exactly how it all happened. I was wondering if an indemnity was like what's called a posting fee when a baseball team gets a player from Japan. And it appears that NFL/AFL players still had to play an option year even to go to another league (Bud Grant to Winnipeg, Pete Gogolak to the NY Giants.

I don't know if Kapp was totally out of football when the Vikings got him, but he had left the Lions and was back in California (working in the grocery business, I think). Also the 1967 story said he came from Vancouver. Were they the Vancouver Lions and not the BC Lions then?

And on the subject of Roman Polanski, I have Polanski in one of the dead pools I'm in.

Thanks again everybody. This is really helpful.
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