Salary_cap In professional sports, a salary cap, sometimes called a wage cap in the United Kingdom, is a limit on the amount of money a team can spend on player salaries. The limit exists as a per-player limit or a total limit for the team's roster, or both. Several sports leagues have implemented salary caps, both as a method of keeping overall costs down, and to ensure parity between teams so a wealthy team cannot entrench dominance by signing many more top players than their rivals.