League slams union’s tactics
League slams union’s tactics
Posted by Mike Florio on November 24, 2010, 8:54 AM EST
In response to the NFLPA’s latest effort to bang the drum about a lockout that the union is poised to block via decertification, the NFL has taken off the gloves regarding the time being spent on matters other than working out a new deal.
Here’s the full text of the statement issued Tuesday by the NFL, and posted at NFLLabor.com:
“Now that the union leaders have concluded their decertification ‘going-out-of-business sale,’ arranged for form letters to be sent to NFL owners by other unions, and issued press releases about their letter-writing campaign to mayors and governors, we are hopeful that they might find more time to talk to us. The union’s request for state and local political leaders to intercede in the negotiations ignores and denigrates the serious and far more substantial problems that those leaders, and that state and local workers across the country face. We can resolve our own issues as we have done many times in the past but the NFLPA has to want to participate in resolving them.
“Every governor, mayor and state legislator understands the need to balance revenue and labor costs. That is why all over the country state, county and municipal employees are facing layoffs, salary cuts, benefit reductions, and other changes in working conditions far more severe than anything proposed by the NFL in these negotiations. In fact, NFL player compensation has doubled over the past decade and will continue to grow under our proposal. And we have offered to increase jobs and improve benefits.
“Nobody — least of all NFL owners — wants to shut down our business. The best way to ensure uninterrupted NFL football in 2011 is for the union to stop asking everyone else to solve its problems and to sit down and engage in serious, constructive bargaining. If the union does so, we can and will reach an agreement.”
And so there it is. The NFL has done exactly what we’ve said the union should be doing. Demanding that the two sides focus their efforts on negotiating a new labor deal.
I’ll be sitting in for Dan Patrick on Friday, and joining the show will be NFL outside labor counsel Bob Batterman and NFLPA spokesman George Atallah. We’ll be asking them why there haven’t been more direct talks, and when we can expect them to lock themselves in a conference room at a five-star resort for three or four weeks of uninterrupted negotiations. At a time when fans are enjoying a wide-open scramble for playoff positioning, we all need to realize that the labor talks are approaching the two-minute drill, and that neither side has displayed the cardiovascular endurance necessary to deliver an accord.
NFLPA: Save money, lockout coming
http://sports.espn.go.com/nfl/news/story?id=5882717
Quote:
NFL union: Prepare for pending lockout
FOXBOROUGH, Mass. -- The NFL players' union has advised its members to prepare for a lockout it expects to come in March, telling players to save their last three game checks this year in case there is no season in 2011. In a letter to the players that was seen by The Associated Press, NFLPA executive director DeMaurice Smith said the union had an "internal deadline" for agreeing to a new collective bargaining agreement. "That deadline has now passed," he wrote. "It is important that you protect yourself and your family." The letter was dated Wednesday, and copies were strewn across a table in the New England Patriots locker room during the media availability on Saturday.
After a reporter asked players about the letter, a Patriots spokesman flipped the copies face-down. NFLPA spokesman George Atallah declined to elaborate on what effect the passing of the self-imposed deadline would have on negotiations, saying the letter was an "internal communication." NFL spokesman Greg Aiello called the union's deadline "disappointing and inexplicable, especially for fans." "We hope this does not mean the union has abandoned negotiating in favor of decertifying and litigating," he said. "We are ready to meet and negotiate anytime and anywhere. But it takes sustained effort and shared commitment to reach an agreement. One side can't do it alone. About an hour after telling the AP, "We don't comment publicly on our internal communications with players," Atallah did just that on Twitter. "Today's memo to NFL players was an internal deadline to prepare, not for CBA negotiations," he wrote, following up with two more tweets: "The NFL knows that we have exchanged correspondence and met regularly," and "To spin this as an end to the NFLPA's negotiating is dumb. Perhaps the outrage can be directed towards preventing a lockout." The NFL has not missed games due to labor strife since 1987, when owners responded to a player strike by continuing the season with replacement players. But the prospect of a lost season in 2011 intensified when owners opted out of the collective bargaining agreement in 2008. Smith has said that he believes the owners opted out with the goal of locking the players out. The NFLPA's home page features a "Lockout Watch" that counts down the days, hours, minutes and seconds until the CBA expires on March 3. The one-page letter on NFLPA stationery said the union expects the lockout on March 4, and that players should work with their advisers to prepare for an impending lack of income. It also said the league threatened to cancel the players' health insurance. The union said it is filing a grievance to contest a cancellation of health insurance, citing a section of the collective bargaining agreement that states: "Players will continue to receive the benefits provided in this article through the end of the Plan Year in which they are released or otherwise sever employment." Patriots offensive lineman Matt Light, one of the team's player representatives, said players understand the nature of the business but the threat to cancel health insurance is different. "You're going to cancel somebody's health insurance and maybe they've got a baby that's due in the offseason?" he said. "Yeah, it gets personal." Aiello said that there would be no interruption of health care, because of the federal COBRA law that allows employees to continue coverage at their own expense. "This means that no player or family member would experience any change in coverage for so much as a single day because of a work stoppage," he said. "The union surely knows this and there is no excuse for suggesting otherwise." Light said he is doing his best to educate his teammates on how to prepare. "They've got to look at it like they're going into a period in which they are going to change their financial situation," he said. "Nobody knows what's going to happen. But if you're going to go a year without getting paid, you need to prepare accordingly." Under the deal agreed to in 2006, the players get 59.6 percent of designated NFL revenues. The owners opted out of that deal beginning next year, arguing they have huge debts from building stadiums and starting up the NFL Network that make it impossible to be profitable. The two sides met last month and said they made "some progress" on proposals involving an 18-game regular season and limiting offseason workouts. Players have taken their case to the public in recent weeks, briefing Congress on the job loss and other economic impact of a lockout and even drafting letters for lawmakers to send to the league. Using many of the same studies the NFL relies on when trumpeting public subsidies for new stadiums, an economist commissioned by the union estimated an average of about $160 million in local spending and 3,000 jobs would be lost in each league city if the full 2011 season were wiped out. The NFL called the figures "a fairy tale." New England linebacker Tully Banta-Cain said he was already squirreling away his savings in case of a lockout. Banta-Cain said he was also working on his outside businesses, which include a clothing line and a music label. "I'm trying to prepare," he said. "And I'm trying to establish my off-the-field businesses and make sure I can make money in the offseason."
I hope the players come back down to reality with their salaries and realize that employers shouldn't make more money than the owners. That doesn't make sense in any other business, so why should it be that way in sports?
Lockout will unlock new universe of cheating
From PFT:
Lockout will unlock a new universe of cheating
Posted by Mike Florio on January 25, 2011, 9:20 AM EST
http://nbcprofootballtalk.files.word..._300.jpg?w=250 While we were all watching the end of the Packers-Bears game on Sunday, Charley Casserly of CBS was sharing highly pertinent information about the manner in which teams can prepare for the 2011 season.
Though Casserly didn’t say it, the application of common sense to his message quickly leads to an inescapable conclusion. To be best prepared after what many believe will be an inevitable lockout, teams need to be prepared to cheat effectively.
In the strike-shortened seasons of 1982 and 1987, the Redskins (for whom Casserly worked at the time) won the Super Bowl. Casserly explained that coach Joe Gibbs reminded the players that they needed to stay together as a team, and he had them engage in organized practices on their own. Given that these things happened long before the days of cell-phone cameras, the immediacy of both supply and demand of the 24-hour news cycle, and the Internet, it would be foolish to assume that neither the Redskins nor any other teams engaged in workouts that were directly or indirectly supervised by members of the coaching staff.
This time around, Casserly says that one prominent quarterback has been scouting facilities that he and his teammates can use for player-organized practices. Another coach gave his players at their final meeting “very organized practice plans for workouts and passing camps that they can do in the offseason.”
Rest of the article:
http://profootballtalk.nbcsports.com...e-of-cheating/
