Me too. Mediating these two groups would be like trying to keep two six year olds from fighting. Just a lot of major league egos going to war over so little. If the court seems predisposed to rule against the owners that may loosen things up a bit. It's a safer bet that the NLRB would side with them but getting a ruling from them pretty much means that the season would be lost.Originally Posted by dabears54
If they can all agree to a court supervised mediation maybe it will finally get done.
just IMO, think the judge needs to hint at something BAD FOR BOTH SIDES, not fvoring either... becuase think if either side, thinks the judge is favorable to them, they will not meet as "can win in court" meantlity will happen quickly.. BUT if both sides, see her as hurting their cases on different issues much more likely to get together for fear of losing something.. as the old saying goes "a deal doesn't happen until both sides feel pain and do not like the deal"....
Players want it in Minny where they will be favored, Owners want in DC where they will be favored.
Screw em both. Go to a neutral site. Bring it to Chicago. Let's handle it the Chicago way
Dagan81 High-fived for this post.
You mean with a deep dish pizza and a couple of beers?
Judge Nelson needs to remain impartial and only caution where it's called for not just to manipulate both sides into an agreement. This case needs to be decided on what the law says and how it applies to this situation. So far she seems to have singled out the NFL for a misapplication of the law and it's never good to site improper laws and how they may apply to the case. That will almost always piss off the judge since they have a law degree too. The NFL attorney also began to challenge her legal authority to preside over and rule on the case. Not very smart at all in my opinion.
Sorry, but things of that nature aren't gonna be appreciated by the judge so they'd be better off if they just stopped going in that direction at all.
Well hopefully it is a good sign to come. As it has been dragging out so long. Hopefully it won't drag out through September. Hopefully things will get done and fast! For us NFL fans!
[[Memorial Day 2013!
well looks like she is going to do forced mediationa nd like this!.. jsut get the fricken thing done! and who cares where its held
NFL, NFLPA still mired in labor dispute Aaron Wilson
The federal judge presiding over the players' request for a preliminary injunction is going to order the NFL and the decertified players' union to return to mediation whether they like it or not and has informed both sides of that pending decision, according to ESPN.
A decision is expected to be announced by Judge Susan Richard Nelson on a venue earlier this week, per the report.
The NFL has made it clear that it wants to resume mediation in Washington, D.C., under the supervision of federal mediator George S. Cohen.
And the players want to conduct talks in Minnesota.
They may get their wish based on comments from Judge Nelson so far.
A conference call was conducted Friday with Judge Nelson with both sides participating.
NFL Players Association executive director DeMaurice Smith has been officially added as a counsel for the players.
So, he can take part in mediation.
goods stuff from king today soul..
My take on labor.
The other day, United States District Court Judge Susan Nelson, overseeing this new case from Minneapolis, told the players and owners, "It seems to me that both sides are at risk. And this is a very good time for you to come back to the table.'' In fact, according to Adam Schefter on Sunday, she ordered them to talk ... but we just don't know yet if it'll be overseen by the federal court in Minneapolis or a mediator in Washington. The players want the former, the owners the latter.
I just want to remind you (and I hope someone from each side reads this) just how close the two sides were when talks broke off a month ago this afternoon. The players said they'd never support an 18-game regular season, and the owners said in the next five years, there'd never be an 18-game season without player approval. Despite lots of rhetoric since, it'd be easy for the players to put it in stone that the 18-game slate is off the table for the term of this deal.
The other non-money things on the table that day -- an additional five weeks off during the offseason for players, third-party arbitration for drug and steroid appeals, a legitimate salary floor of 90 percent of the cap over three years, a cloudy but encouraging lifetime health-care proposal for all vested veterans going forward -- were either all the way or close to what each side could live with.
Now for the money. The league's last offer was a four-year cap proposal of $141 million to $161 million per team, with no chance for players to make more if the league exceeds current revenue projections. The players were asking for $151 million to $161 million over the four years, with a percentage of all extra revenue over the league's revenue projections. In year one, that's a negotiating gap of $320 million plus a percentage of excess profits; in year four, that's a gap of zero, plus a percentage of excess profits. Now, the league would likely see a major increase in year four, that being the first year of the next TV contract with the networks, cable outlets and satellite. In my opinion, that's a hard negotiation. But it's a negotiation certainly worth having.
I'll leave you with a tale of two jurists, two decades apart.
Before there was a system of real free agency in place in the NFL, United States District Court Judge David Doty, overseeing the case from Minneapolis, told the players and owners if they didn't reach an agreement on the issues, he would impose one that neither side would like and one side would find highly onerous. That led to both sides agreeing to players being free after four seasons if their contracts had expired, with one franchise-player exception per team, and a hard salary cap.
Now Judge Nelson is saying both sides are at risk and telling them to get back to the table.
There are differences between now and 1993, though. The players liked what they heard from Nelson last Wednesday and seem to feel good about taking the chance she'll force the owners to end the lockout. The players are not motivated to give an inch in CBA talks. And the owners, as I reported a couple of weeks ago, have a line-in-the-sand point they won't budge on. That's their desire to not have a federal judge be the referee in any future labor disputes that come with officiating the next CBA, the way Doty did with the last CBA over 18 years. So they don't want to let the federal courts officiate a settlement in this case, for fear that the same system would remain in place, a system they felt was tilted toward the players.
My guess is there won't be any real discussions toward a settlement until Nelson rules, and until the loser in that ruling appeals it to the Eighth Circuit Court of Appeals, and that three-judge appeals panel rules. There is risk for both sides in that happening, but I don't see either side being motivated to throw out an olive branch now.
By the way, I'm glad to see the two sides practicing what Judge Nelson has ordered -- public silence, in effect. Nothing good came of the tit-for-tat Twitter and Internet games the players and league were playing during mediation in Washington, and since then.
The fact that they can't even agree upon where the reopened negotiations should take place and who should mediate them shows just how wide the gap between them is. Each of them has drawn there respective "line in the sand" and neither wants to come off of it. Now both just want a mediation environment that tilts the odds in their favor.
I can't see much progress on this until Judge Nelson gives her ruling on the lockout.
The offseason of discontent
Brady v. NFL at its core Andrew Brandt
After all the negotiation, decertification, mediation, litigation and frustration of the past couple of months in football, let’s take a step back and regain an understanding of what this whole mess is about: who gets how much of all of the money coming into the NFL.
Everything that has happened and will happen in this seemingly endless battle between NFL Owners and Players is jockeying for position when the new Collective Bargaining Agreement (CBA) is finally settled/negotiated/mediated, hopefully sooner rather than later.
Never going to trial
Brady v. NFL is an antitrust suit filed by NFL players with some high-profile name plaintiffs – Tom Brady, Peyton Manning, Drew Brees -- whose names are more meaningful in the court of public opinion than in the court of law.
Although Wednesday’s preliminary hearing was about the lawyers, not the players, none of these players chose to make it a priority to be there. As Brady v. NFL continues, it will be interesting to see the commitment of the A-list players beyond lending their name to the proceedings.
As for an actual trial in the case, that will not happen. We will not have the specter of Brady, Manning and Brees being called to the witness stand and being cross-examined by the NFL lawyers. Neither side wants that.
Again, this case was filed because the NFLPA decided on a strategy of decertification and litigation in an effort to make more progress in negotiations with the owners than they had without it. Will they? Time will tell.
What is the problem?
As always, follow the money. The Players want an equal (50/50) split of all NFL revenues. They feel they should be treated as equal partners in the growth of the game.
The Owners argue that an even split is what the Players have from the 2006 CBA from which they opted out (the Players get 59% of revenues, but after cost credits it has worked out to 50% of total revenues). The Owners position is that since 2006 the economics have changed, especially the public appetite for stadium financing and ticket price increases.
The Owners, in their last best offer on March 11th, offered between 45-46% of revenues to the players. Thus, they are not fighting about $9 billion; they are fighting over about 4-5% of that, or approximately $350 million.
As to other issues, they are all ancillary to the revenue split. As happened this weekend in Congress, there will be last-minute horse-trading of most other issues -- rookie salaries, 18-game schedules, HGH testing, conduct, benefits, etc. -- once there is agreement on the big issue.
What about the fans?
What about them? While the two sides have their public relations departments in full throat seeking the hearts and minds of fans, the prinicipals are concerned with their own bottom lines.
In negotiating player contracts on each side of the table, I understood my task. As a player agent, my priority was to maximize cash to the player. As a team executive, my priority was to do the best deal within the marketplace and minimize future risk.
On a larger scale, in negotiating the contract between the NFL and the NFLPA, each side is concerned about doing the best deal possible for them, maximizing upside and minimizing risk. Those are their priorities; the fan is not part of their thinking in those negotiations.
New round of mediation?
Bringing the case up to the moment, Judge Nelson spoke to the two sides on Friday about the latest scuffle about who and where to mediate/negotiate. The Owners prefer Washington, D.C. with George Cohen who has an 18-day head start. The Players want home field advantage under the supervision of Nelson’s court.
After the call, neither side is talking. Unlike Cohen’s earlier gag order (both parties eventually started treated Cohen like a substitute teacher) there could be real consequences – including Contempt of court – if they disobey Nelson.
The good news – we think – is that it appears that Nelson will force them to talk. However, based on the past two years of negotiations defined by mistrust and dislike, I don’t expect much. We will back in court soon, which, again, is all a search for leverage in the eventual broader negotiation of a CBA.
Our offseason of discontent continues…
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