What the Hell is Going On?

It seems like nobody really knows what to do in the midst of the stalemate that is the renegotiation of the current Collective Bargaining Agreement (CBA). Doesn't this sound just like the NHL? The difference with the NFL is that the current CBA has not expired and is NOT set to expire until two more years, after the 2007 season. So why all the turmoil?

The architects of the current CBA didn't want it to expire before and cause a work stoppage, similar to what happened in the NHL. So they designed it so the last two years of it would be so uncomfortable for both the players and owners that they'd have to do an extension now, two full seasons before it is set to expire. If the CBA is not extended by the new deadline of Sunday night, then the salary cap for '06 will go down from the expected 102 mil to 94 mil. That's why heads are going to roll and many big time players will be cut - Uncomfortable for the Players. AND it will be uncomfortable for the Owners because in '07 there will be no salary cap. AND uncomfortable for BOTH after that because there isn't a CBA in place. Also of note, the players would have no health coverage and no 401K in '07.

I don't want to speculate what either scenario means for the Pats except that they DO have a plan A and a plan B depending on a CBA extension or no extension. IF it is extended the Pats will have a TON of money to spend on free agents, so hope it gets extended.

From what I gather, the Players want a 60% cut of what the owners make. The owners are offering 56.2% Currently, the players get 55%. It really gets tricky because there is additional money to be counted towards the cap. As it stands, the players get 55% of all FOOTBALL revenue created by the NFL. That does NOT include smart businessmen like craft generating revenue from parking, selling the rights to Gilette to name the field, and anything else they can sell. The offer from the owners is 56.2 % of ALL revenue. I'm not sure the players understand what that means to them. It calculates out this way: every % equals about 1.4 mil per team on the cap. So 1.4 mil multiplied by the 3.8% difference in the two sides equals 5.32 million per team. Hmmmm 5.32 million divided by 56 players on the team is 95,000 more per player per year. It hardly seems worth fighting over it.

I'm on the side of the owners here. Under the owner's offer the players will get paid 24 billion over the next 6 seasons. 4 BILLION a year for 6 YEARS. That is nearly A-rod money. The message should be clear to the NFL players: The NHL players got fucked when they held out, take the great deal that is on the table and be happy you don't have to go work in a McDonalds somewhere.