[JoeRedskin]

Originally Posted by FRPLG

I don't care if there was an agreement or not. An "agreement" is a hell of a lot different than a legally binding contract or an operational set of rules. Just deciding together not to do it means nothing unless they officially enacted some type of resolution with established rules and consequences. Or at least something that officially forbade it. And why in the world wasn't the solution just to void the contracts at the time?

"Hey don't break any rules that don't really exists or else!!!! Or else, or else we'll let you do it and a whole season later we'll make up a punishment that we have no idea what it could be for now but it'll be bad! NO really don't break the non-existent rule we all agreed to but probably shouldn't ever let the players know about since it can't possibly be legal. Hey wait!! Stop breaking the 'rule'!! "

This.

Further:

This seems a pretty ridiculous thing for the league to do. Either the year is uncapped or it's not. To tell teams, "Yeah, it's uncapped, but don't spend too much this year just because of that, or we'll fine you for it down the road" feels a little bit like collusion to me. But this is the NFL, which does what it wants and makes up the rules as it goes along. The Cowboys and the Redskins surely know that, and the fact that they were the only two teams found to have engaged egregiously enough in this behavior to deserve a huge loss of salary-cap space indicates that they should have known better. I mean, when you're found to be dirtier than the Raiders and the Saints, you kind of have to look in the mirror and re-think the way you're doing business.

Cowboys, Redskins punished ... but why? - NFL Nation Blog - ESPN