AFL Media reports<\/a> the Tigers have banked salary cap space over the 2025 and 2026 seasons, thanks to their young list, and can front-load their offer to blow rivals out of the water.<\/p>\nIt\u2019s expected Butters will land a long-term contract of at least eight years, on close to $2 million a year, but that figure will only rise as more contenders enter the race for his services.<\/p>\n
Richmond\u2019s offer would hit those marks making it the largest deal in footy history – a statistic heavily impacted by the rising salary cap, which has gone from $10.4 million in 2016 to $18.3 million in 2026.<\/p>\n
Proportionally, a $2 million salary in 2026 takes up as much of a club’s TPP as a $1.13 million salary would have a decade ago.<\/p>\n
For context, in late 2017 Dustin Martin was offered $1.5 million a year by North Melbourne, but accepted $1.3 million a year to stay at Richmond.<\/p>\n
Hawthorn and Collingwood are also believed to have interest in Butters.<\/p>\n
\u201cEveryone here wants to win premierships, everyone at every other club wants to win premierships as well. No matter where I am, I want to win and I loved playing with that team today (against Essendon in Round 2). Family\u2019s important as well, it\u2019s been important to me for a long time,\u201d Butters told the ABC recently.<\/p>\n
\u201cMy mum and dad are over this weekend so it\u2019s good to see them. It\u2019s obviously a big decision but I\u2019m not going to make it any time soon.\u201d <\/p>\n
![\"Kylie](\"https:\/\/content.api.news\/v3\/images\/bin\/c9673f13faaafe562019f9698364e740\")
<\/p>\n
On Tuesday night\u2019s edition of AFL 360, Port Adelaide captain Connor Rozee said he had spoken with Butters to try and convince him to stay, but that his mate \u201cdoesn\u2019t give him much\u201d.<\/p>\n
\u201cAll that we can do as a football club is put ourselves in a position where he wants to be here. I know he\u2019s got some of his best mates (here), we\u2019ve grown together, we\u2019ve been together for eight years now, myself and a bunch of other guys,\u201d Rozee said on Fox Footy.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt\u2019s a really tough decision. We\u2019ve had people come and go from our football club; it\u2019s part of the game now.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe\u2019re going to have these conversations throughout the whole year \u2026 he doesn\u2019t give me much (when I ask him to stay), I know that he\u2019s fully invested in this season, and that\u2019s all I care about.<\/p>\n
\u201cThat\u2019ll take its own course at the end of the year \u2026 we\u2019ll wait and see.\u201d<\/p>\n
HOW REVIVED HAWK REJECTED RIVALS<\/p>\n
It\u2019s been revealed Ned Reeves knocked back two powerhouse Victorian clubs to stay at Hawthorn, with the changed ruck rules the catalyst to his resurgence. <\/p>\n
Reeves, who battled to reclaim the number one ruck mantle at the Hawks, re-signed late last year through the 2029 season.<\/p>\n
The 27-year-old, who had played just five senior games across the past two seasons, rejected overtures from Carlton and Collingwood to stay in brown and gold long-term. <\/p>\n
That\u2019s according to the Midweek Tackle\u2019s Jon Ralph, who revealed the \u201ctwo key flashpoints\u201d leading to Reeves\u2019 recommittal. <\/p>\n
\u201cCarlton and Collingwood came at Reeves really hard,\u201d Ralph told Fox Footy on Tuesday night. <\/p>\n
\u201cSam Mitchell came to him late last year and said \u2018Ned, I want you\u2019 \u2026 (Reeves said) \u2018I needed that, because he hadn\u2019t played me for two years\u2019, but he (Mitchell) believed in him. <\/p>\n
\u201cAnd then he\u2019s sitting at a beach in Mexico, and he looks at his phone, and the ruck rules have changed. All of a sudden, (the rules are) incentivising the jumpers, the leapers \u2014 not the wrestlers and the grapplers. <\/p>\n
\u201cHe said to his teammates \u2018I think I might be a chance again, lads\u2019, and the rest is history\u2019.\u201d<\/p>\n
Reeves, who appears to have usurped teammate Lloyd Meek in the Hawks\u2019 pecking order, had the tap-out of the year thus far on Easter Monday, when he hit it down Jai Newcombe\u2019s throat for a clearance that led to Mitch Lewis\u2019 game-tying shot at goal. <\/p>\n
Originally published as Richmond set to table \u2018biggest deal in history\u2019 for Zak Butters<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"An AFL giant has made a $16 million entry into the league\u2019s biggest free agency race. Plus the…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":591423,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[560],"tags":[638,64,63,55,639,85],"class_list":{"0":"post-591422","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-afl","8":"tag-afl","9":"tag-au","10":"tag-australia","11":"tag-australian-football-league","12":"tag-australianfootballleague","13":"tag-sports"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/591422","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=591422"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/591422\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/591423"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=591422"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=591422"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=591422"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}