National Football League: Why is there no labour deal yet?
National Football League owners and players have been standing at opposite sides of labour issues for as long as the NFL has existed. Players were not given their current rights overnight. They fought long and hard for all the benefits they now have. They
fought over the years and on two previous occasions the players went on strike because they were unable to negotiate their demands with the owners.
For the first time in at least 3 decades, the tables have turned on the players and it is the owners who are threatening to lockout players if they do not get what they want. One of the major sticking point is revenue sharing, but that is not the only contentious
issue, as the owners want a billion more dollars.
NFL owners get a billion dollars from almost $9 billion total revenue as expense credit before the rest is split between players and owners. At the end of the day, the revenue is split 50-50 and it has been split that way for years. The NFL argues that player
costs have risen disproportionately and that the NFL cannot continue with the status quo. All the NFL provides as argument are the financial records of the Green Bay Packers, the only publicly owned football club based in the smallest of all the NFL cities.
Asking for that kind of money without so much as giving a justification will not work. The players union has asked that the NFL to release it financial books for examination, but the NFL has refused. Things have progressed and maybe it is about time the
NFL made its’ case for taking more money off the top to cover expenses, if it has not already done so.
The collective bargaining agreement does not provide much in the way of financial transparency to the players and so technically the owners are right when they say that players insisting on being provided the details of the NFL’s finances are not upholding
their bargaining obligations. The NFL cannot really expect players to agree to such a drastic pay cut without an understandable cause.
Allowing players access to the finances of the NFL will not only ease tensions, it might actually open up the avenue for actual bargaining. The players do not want to take any kind of a cut, but if the NFL revenue and expenses are indeed out of sync, then
the players will have to accept some kind of share. Should it be a half a billion? Who knows, but it will bring progress and might be possible to do within the 5 remaining days of negotiations until the 11 March deadline.
What seems impossible at this moment is an agreement regarding an 18 game season. Players have made it clear that they will not accept an expanded season in any shape or form because of the inescapable physical toll of playing that many games each season.
“We have made player safety our biggest concern, and we won't back off on that,” player representative and Tennessee Titans’ guard, Jake Scott said.
New Orleans Saints Jon Stinchcomb, also a player’s representative, said that the negotiations were about more than just revenue sharing. “It’s how you go to work, what your offseason will look like, benefits for former players, how protected are we when
injuries come along.” Any compromise on those issues could end up hurting players a lot more than giving up a larger piece of the pie.
The NFL has agreed to quite a few concessions to get the players onboard an 18 game season. So far the players remain unimpressed by the league’s gestures, but negotiations are continuing.
Recently the NFL has been stripped of $4 billion dollars in lockout funds and has their efforts to block decertification of the league appear set to fail. They have run out of hands to play and at this point they will be lucky to get any concessions out
of the players and have a normal football year. Opening their books can be the first step.
The views expressed in this article are the writer's own and in no way represent Bettor.com's official editorial policy.
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