Sam Burgess’ retirement could cost Rabbitohs $3 million

The NRL is set to consider a salary cap cut to compensate the retiree.

Published by

Mitchell Jones

The NRL is expected to take up to a month to make a decision about Sam Burgess' $3 million salary cap fallout, according to The Sydney Morning Herald.

South Sydney made an official application for a salary cap exemption for Burgess to auditor Richard Gardham on Wednesday, a few hours before they announced his retirement.

Burgess has a long injury history but a left shoulder condition is forcing him to retire. The club claims the problem "only became apparent earlier this year after routine surgery."

The English international still had three years remaining on his four-year contract worth more than $1 million per annum.

Greg Inglis also retired this season despite having years left on his contract but unlike him, Burgess wants his contractual commitments honoured.

Several clubs have suggested that the Rabbitohs should have to foot the bill through their salary cap which would restrict their chances of replacing the 30-year-old.

Burgess suffered a shoulder injury in round 5 against the Warriors and had surgery after round 13 and contracted an infection.

The salary cap auditor will consider three aspects before making a ruling on the salary cap exemption:

“The Player, at the time of termination, was diagnosed as medically unfit to currently continue to train and play elite level contact sport and was medically unable to ever return to play elite level contact sport due to the current level of disability or the significant risk of further disabling injury as a result of playing elite level contract sport"
"The Player, had no similar injury or medical condition to that area of the body that either has or could reasonably be predicted medically to lead to a degenerative condition of that area of the body prior to signing his last NRL contract or if the players contract was signed more than 24 months previous within the last 24 months unless an unrelated single event has resulted in rapid deterioration of this condition"
"A single event that caused the injury could be identified."

Burgess has surgery on the same shoulder in 2018 before signing the new deal which could complicate claims that the condition is not pre-existing.

NRL CEO Todd Greenberg spoke on the matter, "There’ll obviously be questions about what Sam’s retirement means for South Sydney’s 2020 salary cap and beyond."

"There are rules surrounding these matters and it’s important we take our time to work through the facts with South Sydney in a considered and methodical manner."

At an end-of-season gathering for the players Burgess gave no hint of retirement but his brother Tom said that the shoulder had been troubling him.

"He had a bit of pain and had that infection. From there something wasn’t right. Something happened,'' Tom said.

"It can get really bad, those infections. Something has happened to the shoulder. The doctors said they can’t do much for it. That’s the reality of it.''

Published by

Mitchell Jones

5 years ago