Can someone explain the "Active 45" rule to me?

[SatchDork]

Why can't NFL teams use all 53 players on their roster come Sunday? Why can they only "activate" 45 players? Can anyone explain the rationale behind this rule to me? Thank you in advance.

[Rovers]

The owners, the NFLPA. Ask them. Then ask them why they can't negotiate a new labor agreement while you are at it. Might complain about the 18 game schedule too.

 

It's at the bottom of it all, a labor issue intertwined with the CBA, RFA, UFA, salary cap and roster size agreements between owners and players.

[SatchDork]

The owners, the NFLPA. Ask them. Then ask them why they can't negotiate a new labor agreement while you are at it. Might complain about the 18 game schedule too.

 

It's at the bottom of it all, a labor issue intertwined with the CBA, RFA, UFA, salary cap and roster size agreements between owners and players.

 

I get your point, but it's still odd to me. Those 8 guys get paid the same either way, right? They practice all week, right (along with the - what is it - 8 additional practice squad players)? It doesn't seem like any of the parties you mentioned would really care if they played on Sunday, one way or the other. There are only two things I can come up with on that front and neither seems that significant: 1 - the NFLPA probably likes the idea of 8 guys getting paid while NOT exposing their bodies to the beating of an NFL game; 2 - there could be bonuses/clauses in player contracts related to how many games a player actually plays (so both owners and players would have a financial interest). On the other hand, it seems like coaches would absolutely LOVE to have 8 more players available on Sundays. It gives a coach a TON more depth and versatility to work with, plus he can get more in-season player evaluation done.

 

Anyway, from my perspective, it doesn't seem like there is any good reason NOT to have all 53 guys available (I do understand the practice squad being separate) and at least one big, fat, good reason (coaching/evaluation) to let them all play. So why the rule? I'm just wondering if I'm missing something.

[DMD]

the roster limit's growth has been a relatively gradual thing, beginning with the first such limit, 16, in 1925. That number, by the way, increased to 18 players in 1926, remaining static for three years. For further example, the limit was increased to 40 in 1964 and remained at 40 for nine years, through 1973.

 

More recently, the limit has held firm at 45 active players annually for the past 16 years (1991-2007). Each team also has a list of eight inactive players for each regular season and postseason game. Also, provided that a club has two quarterbacks on its 45-player Active List, a third quarterback from its Active List is permitted to dress for the game, but if he enters the game during the first three quarters, the other quarterbacks are thereafter prohibited from playing. Teams also are permitted to establish practice squads of up to eight players who are eligible to participate in practice, but these players must remain free agents and are eligible to sign with any other team in the league.

 

The NFL increased the roster from 40 active players (and seven taxi squad members) to 47 active players (and no taxi squad) in 1974 to keep players from the WFL. They didn't want to subject the seven players who would normally been taxi squad players to waivers (a prerequisite then and now) and thus the possibility of being signed up by the WFL. It was the end of the taxi squad until the developmental squads (renamed practice squads in 1990) were created in 1989.

 

Nfl Meetings

Roster Limit Expected to Be 53

March 23, 1993|BOB OATES | TIMES STAFF WRITER

PALM DESERT — Because salary-cap problems are expected to affect the NFL's 28 teams in unforeseeable ways, the league's club owners will vote today to increase the 1993 roster limit from 47 to 53 players.

 

Paul Tagliabue, NFL commissioner, and Dick Steinberg, general manager of the New York Jets and a member of several NFL committees, made that prediction Monday.

 

 

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On game day, they said, each team will be required to reduce to 45 active players plus a designated No. 3 quarterback--as it did last year. The difference will be that the inactive squads will be enlarged.

 

Each week this season, each club will be permitted to keep seven inactive players, compared to two last year. In another change effective this year, all players put on injured reserve will have to sit out the rest of the season. Previously, some with minor injuries could be brought back after sitting out four games.

 

Next season, the temporarily injured must be carried on the main 53-man roster.

 

"Cut-down dates will be the same," Tagliabue said. "(In the last week of the off-season), the teams will cut down as usual from 60 players to 45, and then build back up to 53."

 

Each club will be authorized to control 58 players, including a five-player practice squad.

 

"The new concept will give us greater flexibility," Steinberg said. "For example, some teams might not want seven extra players. Or they might not keep all five practice players.

 

"They might decide to use the bulk of their cap money on the 45-man squad. The new numbers are simply the upper limits. The key word is flexibility. "

 

*

[SatchDork]

Thanks, DMD, that actually makes a little more sense. The 53-man roster is sort of a myth. What you are really working with is a 45-man active roster with a 16-man inactive roster. It's just that 8 of the inactive guys can be freely shuffled back and forth while the other 8 (the practice squad) are sort of like free agents. If you want to use them, you gotta' "officially" sign them and other teams can sign them as well (I assume there are some rules that allow a team to protect/retain their practice squad players, though). Even with this in mind, I say if 53 guys are collecting gameday checks then 53 guys should be able to suit up and play.

[Big John]

They did this in 1993 when then made IR season ending (it was 4 weeks min before that). So that expanded roster made teams able to stash away injured players on the inactive list without putting them on IR. Rosters were 45/47 prior to that.