Owners Unanimously Vote to Opt Out of CBA
 

Serve to you, player's association...

http://sports.espn.go.com/nfl/news/story?id=3404596

The big question is what does this do to rookie contracts?

Since we still have an agreement through the next 3 seasons I would think it will have minimal impact this year. Next years crop though might get interesting.

I swear the owners and players collectively are going to kill the golden goose. It's a great game with plenty of money to go around for everyone. But the constant brinkmanship by both sides is getting really old.

Upshaw is really going to have to stiffen up or he's going to lose his job.

Let me tell you why I suck as a sales man. Let's say I go into a guy's office, let's say he's even remotely interested in buying something. Well then I get all excited. I'm like Jojo the idiot circus boy with a pretty new pet. Now the pet is my possible sale. Hello there pretty little pet, I love you. And then I stoke it, and I pet it, and I massage it. Hehe I love it, I love my little naughty pet, you're naughty. And then I take my naughty pet and I go
[makes ripping noises as he tears apart the roll]
Uuuuuuh. I killed it. I killed my sale. And that's when I blow it. That's when people like us have gotta forge ahead, Helen. Am I right?

From what I've been hearing, the latest CBA is murdering some of the lower income owners. The owners also all need to be on the same page here or the player's ass'n will divide and conquer.

WooWoo closer to the big owner's dream of uncapped seasons

Great. We can import the imbalanced and pathetic MLB model into the NFL, and ensure that half the league is totally unable to field competitive teams. Terrific. Keen. Wonderful.

NOT.

Yeah, if they go the MLB route, I'm out.

Bring on the strike. They need to fix the rookie salary problem.

Yay! :rolleyes: Let's kill the greatest sport in the world!

NFL owners vote unanimously to opt out of labor deal

By John Clayton
ESPN.com
(Archive)
<!-- end promo plug -->
<!-- end story header --><!-- begin left column --> <!-- begin page tools --> Updated: May 20, 2008, 11:45 AM ET
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NFL Owners Opt Out Of Labor Contract
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<!-- template inline -->ATLANTA -- The NFL officially notified its players union on Tuesday that it will opt out of the current collective bargaining agreement, which could lead to a season without a salary cap in 2010 and a possible lockout in 2011.
Owners voted unanimously Tuesday morning to opt out of the deal, which was extended in March 2006. The NFL had until November to opt out, but decided to do it early instead of waiting for the deadline.

The league, however, emphasized that it will keep negotiating with the NFL Players Association and said games will be played "without threat of interruption for at least the next three seasons."

"A collective bargaining agreement has to work for both sides," the NFL said Tuesday morning. "If the agreement provides inadequate incentives to invest in the future, it will not work for management or labor. And, in the context of a professional sports league, if the agreement does not afford all clubs an opportunity to be competitive, the league can lose its appeal."

NFLPA executive director Gene Upshaw had been anticipating the early termination of the agreement. He met with owners two weeks ago, and from that meeting he asked for audited financial reports from owners to document their economic problems.

<!-- PULL-QUOTE (BEGIN) --> http://assets.espn.go.com/i/story/de.../dropQuote.gif Roger [Goodell] e-mailed me this morning [and] told me they had a unanimous agreement to terminate the deal. My response back to him? 'What a surprise.' http://assets.espn.go.com/i/story/de...opQuoteEnd.gif

-- NFLPA president Gene Upshaw

<!-- PULL-QUOTE (END) --> "Roger [Goodell] e-mailed me this morning [and] told me they had a unanimous agreement to terminate the deal," Upshaw told ESPN's Chris Mortensen. "My response back to him? 'What a surprise.' "
According to the NFL, clubs are obligated by the collective bargaining agreement to spend almost $4.5 billion on player costs in 2008. Players received around 60 percent of league revenues. Growing costs of stadium construction and operations also figured into Tuesday's decision.

"The current labor agreement does not adequately recognize the cost of generating the revenues of which the players receive the largest shares; nor does the agreement recognize that those costs have increased substantially -- and at an ever increasing rate -- in recent years during a difficult economic climate in our country," the NFL said.
"It was exactly what we expected. I'm glad they did it now because we knew it was coming," Upshaw said. "But this is no surprise and the process will move forward. We'll have more to talk about later.

<table align="right" cellspacing="12" width="127"><tbody><tr><td><table border="0" cellpadding="2" cellspacing="0" width="124"> <tbody><tr><td bgcolor="#dddddd"><center>http://espn.go.com/i/sportsnation/sn05/inlinepoll_h.gif</center></td></tr> <tr><td bgcolor="#dddddd">Thanks for voting. Check back shortly for results.</td></tr> </tbody></table> </td></tr></tbody></table><!-- next two graphs from Wall Street Journal --> "When we negotiated this deal we had two stop points that you could decide to terminate, either side. Obviously, the owners have decided to take this termination early. We expected it. But it means that there is football through 2010, not through 2012." NFLPA outside counsel Jeffrey Kessler told the Wall Street Journal prior to Tuesday's announcement that if the owners were to opt out, the union "plans to ask for a greater share of revenues."

Kessler added that "Every deal we've gotten with them, we've received another increase"
"We are resolved to do our best to achieve a fair agreement that will allow labor peace to continue through and beyond the 2011 season," the league said Tuesday.

John Clayton is a senior writer for ESPN.com. ESPN NFL reporter Chris Mortensen and The Associated Press contributed to this report.

If any team in this league has "economic problems", then they just need to go out of business.

I would have to see an example, I find it extremely difficult to believe that any owner or ownership group in the NFL is not making money.

But how much? If it's making a very small profit -- even a few million a year, then ti's a lousy return on investment and a very thin margin on which to operate a large investment.

I'm not saying owners should spin off billions of profit per year, but they're entitled to a reasonable profit.

I hate Big Football.

I agree they are a business and bottom line is what counts the most, however it's not reasonable to me that with television and radio deals, corporate sponsorship, video games, merchandise etc. that these owners aren't making a lot of money. I hope they don't try to flex their collective muscles and cut off the fans as a result. The players however are in real danger of pricing themselves out of the market. As our beloved Chiefs are currntly showing, a low price unproven player is more attractive than an overpayed under performing veteran.

You sound like the owner of the Bills. I feel so sorry for that man, I was thinking of sending him a donation. He even has a lot of his fanbase believing his BS.

Indy gets then 2012 Superbowl. (if there is one)

Irsay of the Colts has been complaining about this, as have others from time to time.

I don't pretend to know nearly enough about what revenue the NFL teams do and don't share, or their bottom lines, to say whether he is exaggerating his problems. I do understand, however, why Kraft and Jerry Jones get pissed at him for not pursuing revenue-creating opportunities when, for example, the Patriots play in "Gillette Stadium" and the Bills play in "Ralph Wilson Stadium".

Exactly.

is your little pets name Nick Athan by chance?

ok tommy boy ;)

I love that!!

They mainly need to fix a couple of things:

1. Revenue sharing- Big teams don't want to split their revenues with small teams. IMO instead of the the salary cap being based on total football revenue it should be based on an amount that allows the smaller market teams to still remain profitable.

2. Rookie contracts- self explanatory

Right now players get 59% of total revenues. That's way too much IMO.

Personally I hope the owners lock them out. The spoiled bastards can go play in canada, arena league, or be happy with how much the NFL overpays them based on what they're worth elsewhere.

Because the Owners not paying their big name players wont make them lose money in the end. Making a few million profit is better then 0 profit at all or losing money. Owners just will not lock them out for to long. No one is going to go see arena league players play in a 80,000 seat stadium. Not going to happen. No way in hell i pay for Sunday ticket to watch scrubs play.


Anyways, adding a 17 game sounds cool. I wouldnt mind an extra game.

They could bring in replacement players and still make money. NFL fans root for teams moreso than players. NFL players also don't have the balls to stick with a work stoppage anyway. Back in '87 most of them were crossing picket lines after 3 weeks. That was over 20 years ago. Imagine how these spoiled rotten bastards of today would act after a week without a game check. They'd be begging to come back after a week.

Well, this will be one less fan thats for sure. No way i am watching that shit.

Not really.

And it IS shit. At least it was last time.

I was being sarcastic Brock. My bad though I forgot the smilie.

They do need to fix the rookie salary cap and make things more equitable between the larger and smaller teams.

If they're going to re-negotiate, I'd sure like to see them increase the pool for retired player medical assistance. That situation has bothered me ever since I read that article about Otis Taylor.

I don't know why an ex-faider is in charge of the union anyhow. He's probably robbing them blind.

FAX

He is. He makes like 8 million per year. The issue about all the retired players being broke and not having any benefits is mostly media hype though. If you really take a look at it they aren't nearly as bad off as you hear.

13-3 will be forever dead
rejoice Chief fans
rejoice

If you guys don't think there is a have and have not structure under the cap without how it's going now you are mistaken, a team like the Bills will not be able to compete with the Pats or Cowboys because they don't turn nearly the same cash..

The Green Bay Packers compete with those teams. The Bills could too.

That's a much different market than Buffalo is....Green Bay is marketed to a pretty large region where the Bills have a little corner of New York with a decreasing population. They are playing a game in Toronto to increase their revenue.

The whole upstate New York region is economically devastated. The relocation of business overseas has created a lot of problems, including high unemployment. The Bills are in a precarious situation.

Perhaps it's time to move on.

Thats easy to say until its your team moving away. Would you feel the same way if they were threatening to move the Chiefs to LA?

Jeez, why does Buffalo, NY still exist? That bankrupt dump of a city should have been placed on hospice a long time ago and allowed to die mercifully.

If this area is as economically depressed as you say, I would have moved a long time ago. Why would I expect anyone else to stay?

The cap needs to be low enough that all teams can meet it and still make a reasonable profit without taking large risks individually, which is how the league has been ran since salary caps came into play and it was near perfect system causing great growth in the sport. The problem is the salary cap has increased astronomically over the past 10 years, and it's gotten to the point that small market teams (including the Chiefs) are consistently playing under the cap which is a good indicator that it's too high and so isn't serving it's purpose of leveling the playing field.
Combine that fact with the economy the way it is and I think it's easy to see that it probably needs to come back down. A really great way to do that would be to work on rookie contracts.