Sporting News on NFL labor situation

NFL owners, players aren't stupid — right?

Clifton Brown, sportingnews.com

Posted: May 20, 2008

You want to believe that NFL owners and players are too smart to ruin a good thing. We are about to find out.

NFL owners voted 32-0 on Tuesday to opt out of the current labor deal, meaning there could be a season without a salary cap in 2010 and a work stoppage as early as 2011. It's too early to hit the panic button. But it's not too early to wonder how this will all play out.

The current system is not perfect. Despite the salary cap, some smaller market owners say they are at a disadvantage, unable to generate revenue equal to teams with new stadiums or teams from bigger markets. The Buffalo Bills' decision to play some future home games in Toronto was not done simply as a favor to Canadian football fans. The Bills are doing it for the money.

Owners, general managers and even a few veteran players are irked by the guaranteed money given to top draft choices. Jake Long might turn out to be a great left tackle for the Miami Dolphins, but there's no way he should be the highest paid left tackle in the NFL before ever playing a down.

So yes, some things about the current system need to be addressed -- but not at the expense of the fans.

Answer this question: When has the NFL ever been more popular? The answer is never. It's a year-round addiction for fans.

For the NFL, the term "offseason" has become outdated. The Super Bowl is followed by the NFL Combine, then free agency, then the draft, then minicamps, then training camps, then another season. It's a year-round cycle that keeps generating more attention from fans and more revenue for owners and players.

Since the NFL's last work stoppage in 1982, the league's popularity has been on a steady climb that nothing has been able to stop -- not the Michael Vick fiasco, not Spygate, not players getting arrested for various offenses.

But another work stoppage would elicit a seriously negative reaction from fans. You can't take their game away and expect them to forgive and forget quickly. And you can't expect fans to feel sorry for wealthy owners, or for players making millions of dollars, especially in these tough economic times.

You will hear a lot of rhetoric during the coming months of negotiations. Players union chief Gene Upshaw will call the owners greedy. The owners will say the current system is unfair. But you have to believe a new deal will be struck in time to prevent a work stoppage. The owners might not like this deal, but a work stoppage would be far more costly.

Senior writer Clifton Brown covers the NFL for Sporting News.