Putting the ‘free’ in markets
I noticed two friends, Anand Ramachandran and Harsha Bhogle, in animated discussion on Twitter this morning. The crux appeared to be that Anand was critical of some of the IPL auction rules as framed, especially the fact that some franchises were gaining advantages on what was supposed to be a level playing field; Harsha’s basic argument appeared to be that in a free market scenario, such inequalities were inevitable. A sub-text to their discussion was whether criticism of the existing playbook was justified; Harsha pointed out that no one had come up with a better solution, while Anand pointed out that a reader could — and in fact, has to the right to — criticize a writer for his latest piece, for example, without necessarily having the ability to do better.
To which I would add merely that criticism is valid, irrespective of the source, and provided it is well thought out criticism as opposed to destructive abuse. I have a job to do, you criticize how I do it, if that criticism is found valid it forces me to think of how that job can be done better, and that is how improvement happens. Leave that thought in the parking lot for now, and consider some news stories that have surfaced over the last 24 hours:
On the second day of the auction, within minutes of the process ending, Vijay Mallya raised some concerns about the question of uncapped players.
The issue was raised a few minutes after Sunday’s auction by Vijay Mallya, owner of the Royal Challengers Bangalore, who said he wondered whether the BCCI could protect the uncapped – read: young – players from being the subject of a bidding war and other forms of poaching.
“Now we look to sign uncapped players and try to complete our team,” Mallya said. “But I urge all the franchises and the IPL governing council to exercise the utmost vigilance while signing uncapped players.”
The IPL has, as Mallya noted, laid down “strict guidelines” for the signing of these players, whose value has increased because of the general dearth of domestic talent and the need to fill squad berths. First, it has laid strictures on how these players can be signed, through a three-way agreement involving player, franchise and the IPL, and with the explicit permission of the board. It is the player’s decision, though, whether he wants to sign the contract and he is free to choose his team.
It has also clearly categorised these uncapped players into three types and set wage limits for each. Those players who made their debut in the last two years will be paid Rs 10 lakhs ($22,000); those in the field for two to five years would get Rs 20 lakhs and those with more than five years’ experience Rs 30 lakhs.
Those two conditions together have raised fears among the franchises – which Mallya vocalised on Sunday – that, far from protecting them from inducements, the system leaves them open to bidding wars that could violate the salary cap. More so because some of these players (see sidebar) could, in open auction, command several times the maximum they can under the BCCI’s rules. The only differentiator in a level playing field, it is feared, will be under-the-table deals.
Mallya’s fears appear well-founded — not least, because if published reports are true, his franchise is as guilty of the practices he warns against as any other. Consider this story:
The fight came to light when Royal Challengers Bangalore threatened to throw the rule book at Karnataka’s Ranji cricketer Manish Pandey — who shot to fame in the 2009 IPL and is among the most talented youngsters — when he showed interest in joining Pune Warriors.
Pandey, 21, is learnt to have rejected an offer from RCB to sign him afresh and shown interest in a deal with the new franchise Sahara Pune Warriors. RCB were offering Pandey fees as per the IPL rule which says domestic cricketers who have played for more than two seasons but less than five should not be paid more than Rs 20 lakh.
Firstly, the whole ‘capped versus uncapped’ player classification makes no sense whatsoever. The IPL is a T20-format tournament; how relevant is having played for India in ODIs and/or Tests to whether you are suited for this shortest version or no? (And while on that — Dan Christian, anyone?) And if that is not relevant, then surely your price must be determined purely on the basis of your suitability for this format? Leave that thought there, too, in the same parking lot — it is one of the by laws in the books the BCCI could do well to revisit.
More to the immediate point, notice the trap Pandey is in? He is within his rights — and within the prescribed format — to turn down the RCB offer; if the RCB then engaged in arm-twisting (complain to the BCCI and get the player banned? WTF?!) to ensure Pandey plays for them rather than seek the best price for his skills, then Mallya is going against the spirit of the IPL, and is guilty of exactly what he warned about.
Ironically, while the RCB is miffed about Pandey going outside his catchment area to snap up lucrative offers, the franchise works the other way when it comes to players outside its own catchment — as with Ambati Rayudu and, in the coming days, most good players now busy with the Ranji finals in Baroda, which has apparently become the next battleground for the franchises. A Rediff report:
Having provided him timely support, Mumbai are once again favourites to retain the right-hander for the forthcoming season of the IPL.
However, Royal Challengers [ Images ] Bangalore could upset their plans and play spoilsport.
Siddharth Mallya [ Images ], director of Sports at RCB, it is learnt, wasted no time after the IPL Players’ Auction, and made a dash all the way to Baroda on Monday morning to snap up Rayudu.
A source told?Rediff.com?that RCB have made Rayudu their priority and are ready to sign him at any cost, within the money-limit suggested by the IPL for uncapped domestic players.
Mumbai Indians will certainly see this as an attempt to poach one of their own players as they were the ones who provided Rayudu a second lifeline.
Another aspect being talked about in the backdrop is how some franchises are working past the salary cap through player retentions. Here’s a related story from the Hindustan Times.
However, after the opening season when the eight teams went into the player auction with a purse of $ 5 million, the cap has been reduced to a farce. While the teams were allowed to spend up to $ 2 million for the second player auction in 2009, last year’s auction exposed the biggest farce when it came to salary cap.
With only 11 slots up for grabs, the the franchises were allotted an upper limit of $ 750,000 but the IPL introduced a further tie-break where teams which were tied had to make an additional secret bid to buy the player. This meant Mumbai Indians and the Kolkata Knight Riders spent at least double the $ 750,000 to buy Keiron Pollard and New Zealand’s Shane Bond respectively.
Come IPL 4 and this farce has been exposed even more. First, the IPL set a total cap of $ 9 million for the whole squad of up to 30 players. It allowed the existing eight franchises to retain up to four players, but reduced the auction cap. Mumbai Indians and Chennai Super Kings who retained four players each went into the auction with a limit of $ 4.5 million. But just because their auction cap was reduced, it did not mean the teams had to pay those players the entire $ 4.5 million.
“The IPL Governing Council came up with a formula that if you retain the first player $1.8 million will be deducted from your packet, if you retain the second then $1.3 million will be deducted and so on,” Royal Challengers Bangalore owner Vijay Mallya said after the glitzy and highly anticipated two-day auction concluded in Bangalore on Sunday. “But never once did the IPL say that we are obliged to pay the same amount to the players, so it is quite possible that while $1.8 million will be deducted from my auction purse, I need not be paying that player $1.8 million. The IPL is really not concerned with that part of it.”
This effectively means the IPL gave franchises a free hand to pay the retained players. According to the buzz in the IPL fraternity, Mumbai Indians – who retained Sachin Tendulkar, Lasith Malinga, Keiron Pollard and Harbhajan Singh – and Chennai Super Kings – who retained Mahendra Singh Dhoni, Suresh Raina, Albie Morkel and Murali Vijay – have spent anywhere between $8 and 12 million to retain these four players.
These are some of the reasons the IPL auction process is coming in for criticism. Firstly, it loads the dice in favor of players who have been capped in other forms of the game, and against players who are yet to get national call ups, but are uniquely fitted to perform in the T20 format. Second, the lack of transparency in how franchises fill up their squads with uncapped players lends itself to systemic abuse. Third, the catchment area concept favors some teams and actively hinders other teams, a situation compounded by lack of official clarity (does anyone know what Pune’s catchment area is, as compared to Mumbai’s?). Third, it pays lip service to the concept of a level playing field for all franchises, while actively favoring the more moneyed teams (it is no surprise really that Mumbai Indians and CSK were the only two teams in favor of player retentions).
Solutions? Here’s a few: 1. Avoid the handicapping of Indian players on the capped versus uncapped model; all eligible players go into one pool, and the bids they attract are purely on the basis of what franchises think of their abilities. This, incidentally, will also in one shot eradicate the abuse of the system when franchises sign up uncapped players, as in the examples above. 2. Do away with the catchment area concept; franchises should be free to talent-spot across the field. 3. If you want to institute caps, ensure that those caps are common to all franchises (how does it help the IPL as a tournament, for say the Rajasthan Royals to have a lower purse than others, thereby effectively ensuring that at least one team out of ten is not up to par?), and then ensure that there are no backdoor workarounds.
Comments?
PS: Some additional reading: Last year, Shah Rukh was ruing the absence of Pakistan players from his team. This year, he rues the fact that Sourav Ganguly is not playing. Duh!
Kunal Pradhan asks if it is okay for Anil Kumble to be sitting in on the auctions — not conflict of interest on the scale of some others we won’t name, but is it conflict in absolute terms?
From a friend, a piece on the IPL business model; the link to the Amit Varma piece embedded within is also worth your while.
G Sampath in DNA on the auctions.
Got any interesting links to share?
PPS: Lots of comments and questions attached to the previous post about N Srinivasan and other issues. Thanks for the feedback — will get down to responding later in the day/evening, when time permits.
Not sure where Mallya is in the wrong here. He was okay with uncapped players being brought into the auction. The earlier rule was – If an uncapped player has played 75% of the games last year, he gets into the auction. This rule was changed recently (by N.S. I suppose) at the behest of MI.
But now that the rule is in place, it is likely that he offered Manish Pandey the maximum possible – 20L. Now if Sahara tries to take Manish with a more lucrative offer (why else would he not play for his home side), Mallya is well within his rights to “throw the rule book at him”.
The retention rule is of course completely bizarre and ended up favoring CSK & MI who retained players like Dhoni, Raina & Sachin (no doubt at astronomical sums) and only lost 4.5mn from their cap. Of course other franchises could also have done something similar, but a) Apart from Sehwag (who was retained), no one else was probably worth it and b) Three of the franchises had a very uncertain future and could not make any commitments.
In the long run, the system needs to move to a running roster. There’s an auction every year of free-agents. There’s a transfer/sale window. There are no wage caps for players. Teams are free to retain players with costs being disclosed and counting against the overall team cap. But I suspect this will only be possible after the league reaches its target of 12 franchises.
The thing is, Ramesh, that lack of transparency I keep talking about. If VM offered the top dollar the rules provide, okay — though I still don’t agree with the ratings, that is a whole other debate. But what if the offer was half maximum? Franchises are, thanks to the way the laws are framed, empowered to do that; the player who decides he is being unfairly treated and decides to go seek employment elsewhere ends up in all kinds of trouble. Which is why I bring this up — it allows franchises to play too many games at the expense of players whose only fault was that Srikkanth had no time for them.
Totally with you on the other points you make.
As I’ve said, I agree that the uncapped player fee is nonsense. But it’s not Mallya’s fault that this rule exists. And for a player of Manish Pandeys calibre, one can certainly assume that Mallya would rather pay him 20L and keep him than use threats & politics to save a few lakhs.
Not suggesting it is VM’s fault the rules are what they are, mate — merely pointed out that this is precisely what he was talking about the day previous. I didn’t make the assumption you did; instead, I assumed that if someone was getting the maximum amount of money he knew he could earn, then there was no incentive for him to go somewhere else.
Secondly, the rules say this: If two franchises bid the same amount for a player (let’s assume Pune is as aware of Pandey’s value as RCB is), then the player gets to make the final call where he will play.
So, assuming both RCB and Pune bid the same amount and MP decides to go to Pune, VM is out of bounds in complaining to the BCCI and asking for a ban, is my argument.
Prem, your assumption is silly. No franchise is going to worry about a few lakhs of rupees for a player like Pandey. It is fair to assume that Mallya is ready to pay the prescribed maximum of Rs. 10 lakhs to him. The problem is other franchise is enticing Pandey with a higher salary (what other reason can there be? Pune’s better weather?) which is illegal and that’s what Mallya is complaining about.
As for why that capped vs uncapped distinction is there – it is again because of the stupid media complaining about how the IPL money is spoiling the youngsters etc. So BCCI said, “ok, fine, we don’t want youngsters to be spoiled, so we will put a cap on their salary”. Of course, real reason is that they want to retain control on the pipeline of players. They don’t want youngsters to ignore bcci cricket altogether and target only IPL, thus hurting their cash-cow: passport-based cricket.
While they can sign the official contract with 20L or 10L as the case maybe-unofficially they could offer an advt contract worth crores !Which would be outside the purview of IPL
The problem is not about domestic players being paid less than specified amount (It might b ethe issue with lesser known names but certainly not somebody like Pandey). Somebody like Pandey will actually receive multiple offers of the specified amount from different franchisees. The issue is when some franchisee makes a deal with Pandey to actually pay him more while is on-paper salary remains at 20 lakhs
Excellent Analysis, as always.
For uncapped Players we can have a Draft system like NBA/NFL has in USA for its rookie players emerging out of College. Also Players should have an option to be a part of the BIG AUCTION or the DRAFT and domestic players should choose between that. Once the big auction is over, the DRAFT can be held to allocate rookie players – players in DRAFT can have fixed salary authorized by IPL for all franchises. The DRAFT rules should be such that a player ALSO has a right to select/ reject a team he has been allocated. But he cannot negotiate salary. Of course lot more rules can be defined to ensure everything is fair and square.
A model definately needs to be carved out to tackle this problem of uncapped players being approached by various franchises and their agents. The sight of Siddharth Mallaya ( bade baap ki bigdi aulaad ) rushing to Baroda to ‘lure’ the likes of Rayadu and Deepak Chahar is sickening. I am sure the Mallayas wouldnt have rushed to Baroda just to view the Ranji Trophy Finals, which I am sure they dont even care about.
As long as there is no undertable deal happening (which might as well be happenning) i.e. as long as on-parper amount (20,00,000 INR) and actual amount are same, Siddharth Mallya has every right to contact any domestic player as per IPL rules
Excellent piece… A player having limited shelf life should be paid a fair amount for his skills. The Franchises seem happy playing premium for uncapped foreigners but have no qualms in giving the local players a raw deal. The IPL governing body messed up in this regarding or maybe this is a concession they gave the franchises for not clamoring for Lalit Modi. This may lead to corruption by powerful franchises exerting influence over selectors to keep some players in their catchment area out of national selection.
Prem, on the Capped Vs Uncapped stuff: I guess the idea behind was not to expose the budding talents in the country into large lucrative money so that they will throw away their cricketing talents for Tests and ODIs. I guess that is a concern raised by EVERYBODY (I dont know about you, but that was the point everybody raised when talking about how IPL is going to destroy Indian Cricket). I guess the entire media almost forced BCCI into coming up with a strategy to insulate young cricketers from the millions and billions. So, I dont understand the motivation behind this criticism now. Media should either give an alternative to the Capped Vs Uncapped stuff, or should never complain that big money will ruin the young talents or should just shut up and take whatever BCCI feels like doing as custodian for Indian Cricket when it comes to the young players. I thought Capped Vs Uncapped is a pretty good boundary-marker. May be they could add a few clauses as well- anybody who played only, say 10 ODIs or 5 Tests, will be considered capped, or somebody who has played at least 5 Ranji seasons, something like that.
Er, mate, how much did Unadkat get, again?
I’ll go with you and say, let’s protect our young cricketers from the problem of too much riches too soon. (Even here, what I would want really is not to stop people from making money, but for the authorities to proactively work with them on managing that money, and keeping their heads — a role, if I remember right, Kumble was vaguely tapped for at some point).
But the problem is, that utopian objective is not getting served. Instead, what we have is more inequity — selectors, for instance, can hand out caps to fringe players with an eye on IPL auctions. Meanwhile, some other players get it in the neck for no fault of theirs. Surely if an Unadkat was worth whatever millions, a Pandey should have been given the opportunity to place his skills at the service of the highest bidder, too? I would agree with your premise if all young players were bought and sold on commonly applicable rules. That however is not the case, no?
Prem: On the capped vs uncapped issue, I visualize a situation in the future, where a young player might offer a few hundred thousand quids to the Indian selector to get him play at least one international, so that he can command a higher price.
But really this is silly. Why should a talented Indian player be denied of his dues when an absolute unknown foreigner whom none have heard of walks away with millions??
I think one of the points missed is the inflexibility of the auctioned players to choose their teams. As an employee I should have as much right in selecting my employer as the employer in selecting me. Symonds may not have wanted to play with Bhajji but will be forced now to do so.
Money is not always the only motivation.
What about PAST-CAPPED players like Hemang Badani, Aakash Chopra, Kanitkar and likes who have played for India in past, have no realistic chance of playing for India again and are ACTIVE in domestic cricket. How do they get signed up? They might have played for multiple teams, which catchment area do they belong now?
Lord knows. The problem with how the BCCI has done this whole IPL thing is, it has made up the rules as it went along; no one really sat down and thought through the various gives and gets and framed a set of transparent, enforceable rules that would hold in most if not all situations.
As per IPL rules, any domestic criketer playing first class cricket since 2006 or before will get paid 50 lakhs. But this rule actually prevents them from being taken up by teams – why would anybody pay Badani or Akash Chapda or Hrishikesh Kanitkar 50 lakhs when they can hire yooungseter for 20 laks (playing first class cricket since 2008 or before ) or 10 lakhs (playing first class cricket for last 1 year) ?
Agree with all your points Prem. The key issue however is what is to be done now? If all “uncapped” players are put up for auction , it is likely that 3-4 teams will spend all their remaining amounts on 1 or 2 players, and then not have any room to update their roster.
As a stop gap option, it may be best to put in all the uncapped players into a random draw, and after IPL 4, open a trade window (i guess that is already there).
Its a painful band-aid solution, but I am not sure there are many other options that don’t lend themselves to manipulation. Then, we can move into a more tried and tested model like the NBA as other readers have suggested. That opens up another Pandora’s box of agents and their ilk, but I guess a total salary cap on the teams with some kind of tax for overstepping the boundary, should in some ways ensure that this does not get out of hand.
Have they not heard of the player draft? If they’re going to insist on not putting uncapped Indian players in the auction (Notice the uncapped overseas players were still allowed to test their market value) then atleast make it a level playing field by having a draft. Set maximum salaries for each spot in the draft. Players have the option of refusing to sign a contract if they’re not happy but wouldn’t be allowed to sign with someone else & hence sit out for a year.
BTW, there are a couple of links that might interest you.
http://hundredpercentbarcelonista.blogspot.com/2010/12/ipl-player-retention-and-auction.html
I’m unable to retrieve the other one as I’m at work, will post it once I get home.
Thanks, Mahek.
Here are two more links that might be of interest. Bear with the rusty writing style, I’m an amateur in the truest sense
http://www.boredcricketcrazyindians.com/2010/04/why-great-cricketers-may-not-make-great.html
http://www.boredcricketcrazyindians.com/2010/04/auction-and-other-issues.html
I was just raising a point of contention, thats all. In my personal opinion, let the young players be ruined, if they chose to be ruined. Ganguly, with all his charisma could not find any bidder who trusted him to continue to play good cricket for another three years. If one young guy falsely assume that a big money at one auction is enough for him and throw away his international career, let it be. We dont have any use of such kind of personalities.
But only thing is that the media should not complain that BCCI and ex-cricketers should not complain that BCCI is exposing youngsters to filthy money. Thats just double talk.
JazzyB: Amazing how you and I are almost always on the same page in exposing Prem’s double-speak
Err… Jazzy, Mohan — whose double talk? I don’t recall making that point, that the BCCI is spoiling youngsters with money. So just wondering what you are “exposing”, Mohan.
Prem, apologies in that case. For some reason, I thought you had made this point in one of your umpteen rants against bcci.
*shrug* No issues, was just amused at that note. I tend quite often to end up answering for comments I never made.
The capped-uncapped business has to go – and for whatever reason, the dice is loaded against Indian players in this rule. In a way, the auction process strives to create a team formation that is very different from how other leagues – say the EPL works. In the EPL it is very difficult to imagine a lowly team to come up and win the league because of the fund muscle the top teams have to build a team. The inherent intent in the IPL model is to create “performance volatility” – where a lowly (IPL1) DC can come up and win the league in IPL2. One wonders if this is to create a more vibrant betting market for the book makers – but we digress.
Besides doing away with the capped-player business, the retention policy has to go (how innocent is the coincidence that CSK, owned by the Rahul Gandhi of Indian cricket, has the most retentions). The team-kitty concept too should be done away with but I haven’t thought through all ramifications. The catchment area concept is a lot of bull – again designed to create ethnicity based support base for the franchisees.
Hmm…a very interesting aspect, it is something that I NEVER COMPLETELY UNDERSTOOD from the beginning. Why a player is not given a choice to play for a particular franchise? But again, in a new league, there is bound to be some sort of restrictions, its not a free-market to start with. Things take time to mature, but even then, I dont know why this point never gets discussed. May be their application forms has a clause that the IPL reserves the right to post them whereever IPL feels like- much like an employer reserves the right to transfer an employee from one location to another once joined, even if the employee does not a particular place or a particular manager?
Why have an auction at all?
Let the teams pick whoever they want, pay whatever they want!!!!
Yes the capped vs uncapped doesn’t make sense and also this auction thing also doesnt make sense. Do away with the auction. The franchises go to individual players and sign them. Just let the market forces take care of the signings (but within a salary cap if needed).
Prem, another way off looking at it, what would have happened had the “big 4″ been included in the auction? From MSD/SRT/VS/KP it is a fair assumption that at least 3 if not all would have fetched a higher price than GG. To have included them, along with bhajji, raina, kohli, malinga would have meant either very imbalanced sides, the need for a higher salary cap, or an “individual cap” ala KP in the third auction… Each of those brings up it’s own issues, the latter 2 options once again favouring the richer sides. Not 100% agreeing with harsha, but there will always be loopholes that favour the wealthy sides.
One alternative — if all players are in the auction, and there is a cap on the total spend, then franchises will be far more careful with their bidding and prices will become somewhat more reasonable. Sands to reason if MI had to pay top dollar for retaining SRT, HS, Pollard etc, they would have less to spend on others. So their options become, bid more reasonably even for the big names. That in turn could bring about a degree of price rationalization, no?
Prem, there could be a catch here, especially with SRT, MSD and VS. These three guys combined are worth all other players when you look at it from a marketing perspective. When you put them into an auction, the whole scale tilts. I dont know, but I am ready to make a bold assumption that the franchisees will be willing to spend huge sums on these players while the others get peanuts. I dont know how healthy that scenario is. Even in the first auction, only MSD was on sale, mind you. You can put big players in an auction when there is no Caps on salaries- but that tilts the entire system for the rich owners (isn’t that how the EPL and other leagues work? only the rich can get good teams there).
I don’t know the right answer. Here’s how I’m thinking of it: I am a franchise, I have $9 million to spend. I would want to go in with a clear idea of what I want in my team: a good ‘keeper; a lineup of batsmen who can bowl, and bowlers who can tonk (generalizing here, but you get the idea — I would in fact break this down even more, and in each category list the players by name that I think are optimal).
That is before the day of the auction, and qualifies as my homework.
Now, an SRT comes up for auction. I’d bid, for sure — but as I bid, I’d keep an eye on where the price is headed. $1.5 million? but of course — the marketing benefits alone are worth it for me. $2 million? Hmm. Not so sure. $2.5, $3 million? I’ll pass — I’d at that stage bet that my greater chance of success is with a well balanced team than with one very high ticket player who cripples me financially when it comes to building the rest of my unit.
I’m wondering if that is not how franchises will think. And whether that in turn will impose some kind of automatic ceiling on the kind of money bid for individual players. Frankly, I didn’t watch the auction, like I said in my first post, but when I saw the list of who bought whom for how much, I was kind of left wondering about the strategies and tactics. Or largely, lack of them.
This is the exact reason that .. ICL came into being; with politics being reason for Young rookies like Rayudu, Balaji et all sidelined .. This is also one of the reasons why, Sportsmen like Devvarman & Sharat Kamal go to US universities instead of tying up with organization like percept in India … And take support form Laxmi Niwas Mittal foundation (in athletics and all sport apart from cricket ) . There is a lot of bullying by Indian Corporates / Moneybags / Politicians who frequently murder young rookies budding career by exploiting them .. In order to keep their brand ambassadors value UP. Many famous and senior sportsmen block young rookies from making money!
I have three issues with Us Indians on IPL
A) Why a Jadeja is paid $900000 and Ganguly go unsold ? Why should an untried ” (White skinned ozzie) ‘ brand me a racist if you want ! And christian’s be paid so much and TESTED Rayudu & Pandey be used as Satraps /Bonded Labour/Slaves ?
B) Why were all the English players totally ignored? C’mon guys you can’t Ignore a Kevin Peterson(only $ 650 000 ) , ! The fact that Pommies decimated the Ozzies in every department in the recently concluded Ashes series . Still the Australian coaches and managers, deliberately ignored them. (Ozzies are worst racists than Poms ) . When we criticise The BCCI selection committee on every team selection , putting them under CT-Scan on National television , bombarding them with insult after insult, with the help of ” opinionated panelists with vested interests and brand managers ” Why is the media silent on Gayle/Ganguly omission .. Don’t you know the statistics ? With 2 matches less he(Ganguly ) is #4 on strike rate n he is an astute captain & bowler too?
C) The job of franchisees is to look at commercial interests .. I will advise them for the next process .. Since IPL Rules specify a number of domestic & national players , the international players are foreign coaches job , whereas the Indian part be Handled by Indian Coaches/cricketers & that of rookies to Indian Scouts .. As a music mentor I pick up raw roughs from streets, my proteges though very inexperienced , trounce the industry experts choice (unless judgement is fixed) since I am man on the street and an experienced hand, my judgement never goes wrong . I would like Mr Srinivasan Mr Mallya Mr Subroto Roy & Mr Wadia all astute businessmen to refer to Cost Accountancy Books on decision making like ” make or buy ” ” import or domestic ” ” produce or stop ” ” retain or sell ”
Have One Manager above two scouts one Indian, one foreign, and the manager to take the final call, based on presentation of both scouts .. Logically
The article is bang on and raises valid issues in players interest and cartelisation & bullying and bonded slavery ! I like the logical presentation with facts . Great piece this .
My view I see a cartelisation and some vested interests producing a Sham of #IPLAUCTION of the same level of the 2G scam , if Subramaniam Swami is asking for cancellation of 2G auction in Public Interest, what’s wrong in the Kolkata crowd asking ‘ no Sourav no IPL ‘ & for blood of SRK/Red Chilies & Kolkata Nightmare Riders ? After all there is No difference between Warne, Brett Lee , Gilchrist all retired ex-cricketers I’m still perplexed why Ganguly was not Bought ! The reason is not CRICKETING one ! Alas Shame ! $ 400 000 is pittance Ra 1.8 crores ! 1/4th of the Pathan brothers final bid & less than 1/4th of Ravindra Jadeja’s CTC ! Ha A JOKE THIS !
Oh wait — I was offered three different jobs at around the same time. The pay packets were fairly in alignment. I picked Yahoo. Could be the weather in Bangalore, could be what I saw as the long term opportunity — whatever; it was my choice to make. In this case, the player has the option of deciding which franchise he wants to play for — the BCCI itself put that clause into the mix, it is not something I am saying.
Secondly, there is a clause that says, if two franchises want a player and bid identical amounts (which would happen in this case, since there is a defined cap and knowing the player, both would have offered the maximum possible), there is provision for a secret bidding as tie-breaker.
So why not follow the rules you have instituted? If RCB and Pune both want Pandey, and are offering identical amounts, have the secret bidding take place and give him to whoever bids more, within the overall cap each franchise can spend. End of story. Why prohibit the player from playing for who he wants to? maybe he is making the call because of Pune’s weather — that is a right you have given him. Maybe he is making the call on a belief that in a lesser franchise, his opportunities to shine could be greater.
If we assume that both RCB & Sahara are offering Manish the same 20L, then yes Manish has the right to pick for any arbitrary reason.
But we can at least speculate – why would Manish want to play for Pune instead of his home side. RCB has so far been (after its IPL-1 fiasco) a pretty decent team to play for, plus it is Manish’s home team.
All I am saying is that if Manish still opts for Pune, it is quite likely that Sahara is offering him some under-the-table money. Yes, there is no proof, all I’m saying is that it seems likely.
In all fairness he is entitled to the money but that’s another debate (most of the people here, including me, agree that uncapped players should have been in the auction)
If Mallya however wants to play by the rules (which, in this case suit him) he can’t match Pune by also offering under-the-table money. Hence he is saying that if there is any proof of this happening, Manish (and I hope Sahara) is punished. Perfectly valid stance.
Re the tie-break auction, that was only for the new players who came in in a year that had no auction (and no caps). In fact it was quite a shady method wherein BCCI (or IPL) keeps the surplus bidding above the player’s cap.
Ramesh,
Not necessarily that Manish might want to play for RCB,just because it has done better in the last few seasons.As an emotional individual he might also think-this franchise does not care for its local players or players who have done well a la Steyn,Utthapa,Ross Taylor,Kallis,Dravid,he might not have the same affinity with the new bunch he may as well make a new beginning.he might have also felt out of place with all the party culture of RCB! Maybe conjecture
Prem:
Excellent analysis. As always. I have blogged on this in similar vein at:
http://i3j3cricket.com/2011/01/11/uncapped-players-or-thinking-without-a-cap/
As I say there, dad or no dad, Mitchell Marsh (an “uncapped” Australia player) is on a pay packet of about Rs 1.5 crores while, together, his new team (Pune Warriors) can aim for a collection of Ajinkya Rahane, Shreevats Goswami, Abhinav Mukund, Manish Pandey (this guy has an IPL century in his resume, by the way), Deepak Chahar, Harmeet Singh and Ambati Rayudu, and still be left with about Rs 10 Lakhs in the kitty!
This is way too silly for me to digest!
The reason why this situation came? – Everybody was afraid that IPL will ruin Indian Cricket. Whom to blame?
You know what is going to happen? MI team will read: Sachin,Sehwag,Gambhir,Dhoni,Pollard,Steyn,Morkel,Hussey…you get the drift. I can’t even imagine the kind of discussion that is going to happen..:-)
JazzyB: That is what free market is all about, isnt it?
Basically BCCI has started running the IPL exactly as they run everything else, in fact exactly the way our country is run. : Create all kinds of arbitrary rules under the guise of working towards extreme fairness and public-dictated morality, but actually end up giving the “insiders” all sorts of advantages. Currently the insiders seem to be CSK & MI, and so they are thriving.
Modi understood market forces much better, and so pushed for a lot more openness with the franchises (they used to have workshops & seminars where rules were understood, discussed & finalized).
So while the current regime is somewhat like socialism and the politics of pull, one could say Modi’s was relatively more free-market capitalism, with of course, an unhealthy dose of crony capitalism thrown in. The irony is that because Modi’s cronies ran the smaller franchises, his actions perversely resulted in levelling the playing field somewhat. Ok, I’m getting confused myself.
Ramesh, exactly. Modi was like PVN – threw open the doors of a closed, inefficient system to capitalistic forces. Even the charges of crony capitalism are tenuous at best. As he has repeatedly said, there just weren’t anyone else willing to buy franchises at that time. Everyone was busy scoffing at the idea of playing a club-based tournament in a country where cricket-watching used to be driven so much by patriotism (“who will cheer for Brett Lee bowling to Tendulkar” was the constant refrain back then). If people wanted to buy franchises, it was an open auction, anyone could have bought them.
Who will check the BCCI stupidity. It is looking more and more like our Congress government.
IPL-4 has been completely arbitrary. An India “cap” has been pretty arbitrary last year too, and some folks with just a game or two in Zimbabwe in a series no one was interested in walked in to the auction. Pity that the Indian players do not have a strong association which could have addressed this mis-treatment of the uncapped players.
Also, I see no reason to pay the senior ranji trophy players more money. If anything, they are not good enough, despite having played for so long (not good enough to get into the Indian team that is). Why should they earn more? With politicians at the helm, socialism had to figure somehow into the picture. BCCI makes sure that people do not complain that “kal ka chokra” earns millions while old person with experience earns nothing. Does no good for the “free-market” system! I see no reason why Sunil Joshi should get more than Manish Pandey.
Who will investigate NS role in all this? MI surely greased a lot of people (he does have an infinite well of money) to get their way.
And VM banning Manish Pandey will be really unfortunate, unless VM can prove that Pandey . MP has the choice to go play for Pune (unless VM can prove that MP has a new penthouse in Sahara city)…
I was reading other blogs which pointed to the loophole about player retention, and quite surprisingly, people were supporting it by saying that Tendlulkar should never play for Kochi !
Personally I do think that the IPL Model should have been on the lines of creating a hunting ground for Test Cricket. This can be achieved using an alternate model that I state below.
Firstly; We need to create Core teams (maybe through merging Ranji teams; viz. Bengal and the North Eastern States, Punjab + J&K + Himachal + UttaraKhand, Delhi, UP + Bihar + Jharkhand, Rajasthan + Saurashtra, Baroda, Maharashtra + Goa, Mumbai, MP + Railways, Orissa + Andhra Pradesh, Hyderabad, Karnataka + Kerala, Bangalore, TN)
We open it up from franchises who can take up to 10 players from other countries and atleast 2 India Present day Test Players.
Create a weekend cricket situation vis a vis the IPL and probably a 2 day test match kind of situation with 50 overs per team per innings and possibilities for following on at 100 run deficit.
The limit should be on 4 foreign players.
Availability should not be an issue if teams are able to identify international players as everyone does not play all the time.
This can run parallel to international cricket. In case India is playing at that time then the local players must pick up the responsibility.
All capped players need not be bought at an auction but they can command their own price. I expect the minimum mandate of 2 India Test Players and international commitments will remove any issues of over pricing as compared to player availability.
We can have day night cricket as an added bonus to pull crowds to the grounds.
If anyone saw and remeber on MAX what Arun Lal said on this – about how the franchises would go after uncapped players. He openly said that they could do something beyond the BCCI laid fees (20L for Manish Pandey for example) by signing on other lucrative contracts (ads, endorsements, etc). So, I think if he can openly say on TV one can imagine what sort of deals can happen behind the scenes! The only consolation is that then the uncapped players may not get the raw deal. wow, corruption is going to solve this mess
Prem, adding to the conflict of interest issue for Kumble, there are reports of BRC “arm-twisting” Manish Pandey by suggesting that his state association may frown upon such a move and he may lose his Ranji spot… any comments on that?
Also with regards to the under the table offers – endorsements etc, could it not also be that Pune offers Pandey a better playing opportunity? Pune have 2 Indian batsmen, while Bangalore have 3 and are said to be gunning for Rayudu – from a purely professional point of view Pandey stands to gain more exposure playing for Pune. If that is the main reason he moves then it’s probably unfair for BRC to move to such lengths as to try and ban him. For that matter I would love to see at least one decent domestic player make the clever professional decision to sign up with Rajasthan, or any other squad where they are trying to fill an obvious vacancy in their starting line-up, rather than their home team / the team which offers them the most money. (For example a batsman signing to Kochi, Punjab or Deccan is almost guaranteed a decent run, whereas signing to Chennai, Mumbai or BRC would mean failures are treated more ruthlessly) (For that matter ANY domestic player who signs up to Rajasthan or Punjab would be looking at a good number of games to showcase his skills)
Why is everyone assuming MI will spend as indiscriminately as Manchester City? As a huge CSK fan, I’m glad we retained MSD and Raina. I guess the only way we will see some ‘normalcy’ in the selection process is when we finally settle down with a trade policy as opposed to the auctioning. When is that slated to happen again?
And Prem, I wanted to get in touch with you about something. Can I drop you an email someplace please?
Akshay, sure — prem.panicker@gmail.com gets me.
My thoughts on the Kumble conflict issue..http://wp.me/puHlJ-45