24 replies to this topic

[Duh Huh Dull Sucks]

The NFL Lockout is looking more and more inevitable. What are everyone's thoughts on this? The way it sounds, there is a serious threat to the 2011 season being played.

[FrOnT RoW JOE]

eff em all!!!

[gamekeeper]

One thing that always amazes me is that, this is a business, and the gentleman who own the teams are business men. They are not going to own and run the team just to have a team and lose money. (Well unless your the redskins). So they want to make money, and they want to be competative. I think the Rookies salary cap, is a big problem, and it henders teams, if their first round player the draft is a bust. So I agree with the owners that they need to cap the rookies, and well the 18 games, if they could increase the salary cap to allow them to have a better paid 2nd string QB, and increase the roster by a couple of players to allow more back up backs. Then I think 18 would be the max of games for the season.

Personally I think they could do like baseball and add more teams to the playoffs and get the same results. Football players are not unlike any other employee, we don't get to see the books of our employers profits and where they are spending them.

[Duh Huh Dull Sucks]

Surprised this isn't a bigger subject with people.

I would love to see 18 games, but I completely understand why players wouldn't want to go to a schedule that long...especially without adding more players to a roster. I think a team averages 4 injuries per game which will result in a player missing time...at least I think I read that.

And I think a rookie salary cap would go a long way in ending the lockout (potential lockout, at this point), but limiting what a player can make during his most productive years is just what the players do NOT want. If a player is "capped" at making a smaller salary and his contract isn't guaranteed (like NFL contracts aren't), he could get injured and then cut. So, when he had a promising career ahead of him before injury, he is limited to making much of anything because of a rookie cap in the nation's most dangerous sport.

And I don't think any owners are losing money in the NFL when we're talking about an industry arguing over something like 10 BILLION dollars in annual revenue.

[FrOnT RoW JOE]

Everyone is making money...players,coaches,owners,sponsors,popcorn man, cotton candy man, beer man, fantasy owners, big wigs...why change it???
I personally dont want to see 18 games, sure as a fan I kinda would, but these guys already cant play full years, add 2 more games, just a reason for someone to hold out due to minor injuries. Rookie Salary cap needs done, no matter what. These guys come in, get all the money, while vetrans who earned their stripe are not getting paid the same. How would you like a newbie coming yo your work, after 12 years of service, making way more than you. Just not right. Beside that, a team invest all this money in a flop, it could take years to rebuild and recoop after something like that.

[gamekeeper]

I don't think personally people are getting to fired up because they honestly feel that the strike will ever happen and it will be football as usual. It is early yet. I think if this is still dragging on come Draft day, then people will start talking about it more.

I don't think the owners are trying to limit the amount of money a player can make, Look at Manning. I just think they want to control their first two to three years.
And I also don't think the owners are losing large somes of money. But i still stand that players are paid a salary they areed to and so, how can you say you are not making what your worth. I just don't understand how anyone can think a rookie QB who has never played a down can make more money than 5 year QB, that though may not be a star is porductive, and has been in the league. Or a Rookie lineman making more money than a 8 year vet.

That's like going into your job today and ever new person that is hired is probably going to make 5 - 10% more than you and you have to train them, and the company isn't even sure if they will even show ready to work on a regular basis.

Edited by gamekeeper, 03 March 2011 - 11:05 AM.

[tigerball13]

Everyone is making money...players,coaches,owners,sponsors,popcorn man, cotton candy man, beer man, fantasy owners, big wigs...why change it???
I personally dont want to see 18 games, sure as a fan I kinda would, but these guys already cant play full years, add 2 more games, just a reason for someone to hold out due to minor injuries. Rookie Salary cap needs done, no matter what. These guys come in, get all the money, while vetrans who earned their stripe are not getting paid the same. How would you like a newbie coming yo your work, after 12 years of service, making way more than you. Just not right. Beside that, a team invest all this money in a flop, it could take years to rebuild and recoop after something like that.

But it should be based strictly on merit, not how long you been doing it, right? (SB 5 jab)

[WONBulldog]

Sooner or later I'll chime in on everything and the masses will be so uber-impressed that I will be called in to help settle the dispute.

But going full tilt into it on the smart-ish phone would take too long.

I will say that one worry about the rookie cap is the lack of guaranteed contracts and the max years a drafted rookie in certain rounds can be signed for. Current high picks are under control of teams for 6 years in most cases. If you are an undrafted free agent you could be making the big bucks in only four years (assuming restricted free agency remains...less if it goes away) while the top pick who may be outperforming that free agent still is stuck on an undervalued rookie deal where he was slotted monetarily in the draft.

Obviously lots of arguments on both sides, but I'll go nuts on a post sometime in the future.

[FrOnT RoW JOE]

But it should be based strictly on merit, not how long you been doing it, right? (SB 5 jab)

but what has a COLLEGE QB proven once he hits the leagues?? nothing other than he can play against undersized, slower players players

[gamekeeper]

Right now though it looks like they are not even close to being on the same page. I agree that Rookie caps do have they're downside as Wbulldog pointed out.

But I don't think they are even close enough to agree on anything to where they even can sit in the same room.

[dhsdawg06]

Don't care anymore. The NFL has long been my 3rd favorite pro league(MLB and NHL ahead of it), and this is making me care less and less. If they get a deal done, great, I'll watch cause there's nothing else to do on Sunday afternoons in the fall. If they don't, oh well. I'll find something.

[Duh Huh Dull Sucks]

Well, they extended the current CBA through Friday. Let's hope a deal gets done. I would hate to see football follow the prior routs of other major sports - baseball cancels the postseason and World Series and takes forever to recover with fans, basketball plays only half a season and hasn't regained its place as most popular sport in the USA, and hockey cancels a season (although polls from that time period show it didn't matter because the majority of the country didn't know about it or care to know about it because it was hockey!). Football is America's sport right now and I think both sides realize they have a lot to lose by having a labor stoppage.

[Duh Huh Dull Sucks]

Union decertified. Players will file an anti-trust lawsuit soon if the owners don't come up with something fast. The players should win that, but if it drags on long enough that it actually GETS to the point of the players winning, we'll likely have missed an entire season.

Shame on the owners. They got greedy and the players stood strong in the face of it. May Jerry Jones lose every dime he has.

[FrOnT RoW JOE]

No football season will be like a funeral every Sunday to me....

Greed is what everyone is always about....I think players get paid to much, owners, coaches, they all make to much....after all they are the players are the ones making money for these owners, so why not make sure they stick around and give a little something more to them....

[flounder]

Right now, I am waiting on WONB to give his opinion..........I usually agree with this guy!!!!!!

[WONBulldog]

Right now, I am waiting on WONB to give his opinion..........I usually agree with this guy!!!!!!

Flounder is a douchebag.

[TiGgEr3]

Good riddance

[WONBulldog]

Ok...let me see if I can hit all the key issues. I mean, I would have gone nuts on it earlier, but being under a gag order from that Federal mediator fella', I really couldn't talk. But, of course, now I can.

And if you believe that first paragraph of this post, I have some property deals to discuss with you, too!

Ok - 18 game season. Owners want it because of - why else - more money to be made! Players don't want it because it exposes them to more hits. The season would drag on longer. As it is, the average career is only 3 or 4 years in the league. Add two more games, that likely diminishes because of injury. There are something like 4 season ending injuries in every game played (not per team). Add two more games, that's 128 more players out for the season, hindering a team's playoff hopes or momentum or whatever else. Add in the fact that the league only recently started taking head injuries seriously and the league's desire to cut into post-career care and adding two games is something no player would want. It is my understanding the players won't even negotiate an 18 game season, as it is on the "no chance" list. However, I don't think the owners are really worried about it in the first place - they are just throwing that out there so that they might be able to drop it later in the bargaining in order to get something else they want. Without expanding rosters so there is essentially a full 2nd team available to all teams, it just wouldn't be feasible. Active game day rosters would have to be like 75 players instead of 45. Right now, pretty much every player that dresses will play except for the 2nd team QB (3rd string isn't considered dressed unless he plays, which then results in the 1st and 2nd string not being eligible to return). Without giving the players MORE money, that just wouldn't be feasible to have that many players getting paid. So we move on to...

Division of Revenue. Right now, we have a league worth over 9-billion dollars. They start the sharing by taking a billion off the top and giving it to the owners to "promote the league" and "enhance marketing" or whatever. Then the players get 60% of the remaining funds paid to them while the owners get the remaining 40%. The owners want to take TWO billion off the top and work to cut the percentage the players get. This is just absurd, of course. The NFLPA asked for documentation to show why it was necessary and prove that teams were in trouble, but the owners couldn't provide anything. They offer "limited" disclosure, but that would be like me telling a bank I want a loan from that they can only get "limited" information on my past loan activity, and I get to choose what it is. Remove that I defaulted on 8 home loans and 32 cars, but leave in the one car I didn't default on and my handwriting award in grade school. That's really not providing the necessary information to make a decision on a loan, is it? Of course not! So the owners think they can do that, which is absurd.

Are we noticing a trend yet?

Rookie wage scale/rookie cap. I've kind of already gone off on this, but I'll go a bit more. Let's revisit what I've said...

Sooner or later I'll chime in on everything and the masses will be so uber-impressed that I will be called in to help settle the dispute.

But going full tilt into it on the smart-ish phone would take too long.

I will say that one worry about the rookie cap is the lack of guaranteed contracts and the max years a drafted rookie in certain rounds can be signed for. Current high picks are under control of teams for 6 years in most cases. If you are an undrafted free agent you could be making the big bucks in only four years (assuming restricted free agency remains...less if it goes away) while the top pick who may be outperforming that free agent still is stuck on an undervalued rookie deal where he was slotted monetarily in the draft.

Obviously lots of arguments on both sides, but I'll go nuts on a post sometime in the future.

Ok, let us expand on that. What other jobs out there are there where your employer essentially "picks you" and then has control over you in that profession even if you DON'T want to work there? Well, outside of sports, there probably aren't many, as any employer can offer me a job and I can turn it down and go elsewhere. In the NFL, you are picked by a team and they control you until they don't want you anymore. Your contract is not (presently) guaranteed. You can get cut and be unemployed any day after working for an "employer" (team) that you didn't want to work for in the first place, or wasn't really a good fit for you. So how do you rectify that so that players are still making the money they could be and the owners keep the control over the player they want? Fewer years on contracts? Owners say "no" because they want the continuity of players on their teams and control over players they have invested a draft pick in. No team will want to invest in a QB they cannot keep for (I would guess) at least 5 years - one year to sit and watch, one year to take your lumps, one year to breakthrough, and then into your years of being awesome. That is assuming you don't play for a team that gets you no "help." So what, nix the draft? Owners scream "no" because then some teams cannot build a competitor...cuz, seriously, who wants to play in freakin' Cleveland? The only solution the owners offer is "pay them less, let us control them as long as we want." That's not a solution! What would happen if there was no draft? Teams would be bidding for the services of a player with monstrous sums of money! See Yankees v. Red Sox bidding wars. So saying costs of rookies needs to be brought under control is really a problem the owners created for themselves. I believe the NFLPA offered a plan wherein players would make a salary based on a scale, but there would also be additional income the owners were required to pay between all the rookies based upon performance so that a team's investment in a "bust" wasn't as substantial. Essentially, additional compensation would be given after the season was over out of a pool of dollars the NFL would be required to have available to be disbursed. Basically, if a 7th rd pick at WR gets 100 catches and 1500 yards receiving with 15 TDs and the 1st rd pick (who would still be making more based upon the scale) gets 10 catches and 150 yards and one TD on the season, the 7th rd pick would end up getting paid a larger sum out of the pool of additional dollars because his performance warranted it. Of course, the owners rejected it. Go figure.

Anti-trust Issues The NFLPA just won a big suit against the NFL because of a TV contract they struck back in 2008. Normally players would share in the revenues of the TV contracts. However, the owners arranged for the contracts to pay HUGE sums of money in 2011 even if no games are played! It would be the biggest sum of money spent of any years of the contract, which extends beyond 2011, I do believe. The NFLPA claimed the owners shouldn't be allowed to receive that money because it shows they were committed to the lockout. A court agreed. I mean, seriously, there was no doubt! And now that the owners have locked out the players, the players will be filing an anti-trust lawsuit seeking an injunction against the owners locking them out. Honestly, they'll probably win that. The owners have a terrible record in court because they are greedy! They'll have to release their financial records to the court to prove they didn't start planning this years ago and to prove that they need the concessions from the players. Now if they wouldn't release that info to the players to avoid the lockout, do you think they'll want to release to a court? Uh...no...of course not! Essentially, don't be 100% sure football won't be played in 2011. If a court issues the injunction, the league plays under last years rules until a new CBA is worked out or a court lifts the injunction.

I would probably type more, but I have somewhere else to be in a bit! So if I missed an issue, LET ME KNOW! Keep this in mind - the owners voted for the CBA back in 2006 by a 30-2 vote. I believe it was Mike Brown (Bengals) and Ralph Wilson (Bills) who voted against it, as they were wanting more revenue sharing amongst owners. There were no issues with what players would make. However, in 2008, the owners voted to opt out of the CBA and set up the uncapped year and the potential for a lockout in 2011. They then began signing contracts which would push as much compensation for players back into the 2011 season so they wouldn't have to pay it if there is a lockout...essentially giving them a benefit for the league to not operate in 2011. Owners pushed bonuses for being on a roster to after the beginning of the league year instead of where they normally were (at the beginning of the league year) so that if the lockout started and lasted a few weeks only, players wouldn't receive the bonus! The owners WANTED a lockout before April because they pushed a lot of dollars owed back to that time so they could avoid paying them during a lockout. In the end, the players will probably get their bonuses via the courts, but the owners have been preparing for this for a while and are trying their hardest to ensure it happens. Why? GREED! They saw the deal the NHL owners got to save their failing league and were jealous. However, the NHL players HAD to make concessions because teams were hemorrhaging money left and right. Salaries were out of control for a sport which ranks behind figure skating and gymnastics in interest level in this country. The problem here is that the NFL isn't a failing league. It is one of the most successful leagues ever at this time! Their argument is flawed and they don't have the "books" to support it.

Yes...if anyone else has an issue I missed, let me know. And if I misspelled a lot of words, sorry. I wasn't really paying too much attention to what I was typing in between sips from the Bud Light can.

Edited by WONBulldog, 13 March 2011 - 07:02 PM.

[Duh Huh Dull Sucks]

I think the majority of the fans side with the players concerning the lockout. But hearing that players may have their own draft day party for top picks sounds just a bit beyond what should happen. I think the NFLPA will lose some support from this, if it happens.

[fiver]

I think they should get this solved before the season begins. But I've heard they have an 8 game slate ready to use