official: union decertifies

[HarveyWallbangers]

Mr. Smith is upholding the gains Eugene Upshaw negotiated successfully. The previous deal favored the players slightly. The owners vowed revenge -- failed to renew the recently expired collective bargain agreement and attempted to secure a $4 billion "loan" from the networks.

IMO Mr. Smith is an smart articulate black union chief that is standing "toe to toe" with white slave (oops I mean NFL) owners. The owners know the players have the courts on their side. Owner rhetoric attempts to turn the fans against players which works to an extent. A deal gets worked out since the owners do not want to be exposed for silly spending.

Stand-up and applaud the players for doing what is right.

I tend to blame the owners, but this is just plain retarded. Didn't we leave shit like this behind when Obama was elected? This gets my retard seal of approval.

[RashanGary]

I'll just repeat a couple points that I thought were good so far.

1. This sucks because the Packers are on the verge of greatness
2. I'm definitely going to follow the Badgers very closely this year and I hope they can help me move on from the Packers


Owners mean nothing to me. There could be 32 publicly owned teams like the Packers and the product would be just as good. I'd just as soon see the pie get divvied up between the players who bring us the great entertainment rather than the 32 rich old guys who could very easily be replaced by 32 Mark Murphy's who make a million per year. And probably, the product would get better without the owners. It would be nothing without the players.

[Bretsky]

Justin,

I'm not sure this is the year to go full bore on the Badgers; the just lost a very good DC and there are some questions on both sides of the line. I think they will be alright next year and the year after might be a very strong one. Good group of good attitude kids w/o much drama...........at least they won't be selling merchandise out in public

[red]

The real SNAFU is that the owner's rep is claiming he gave the union all the financial information they asked for, profit/loss for individual teams, etc. The union is claiming they haven't received what they wanted. They are apparently so far apart that they don't even know what the other is asking for :-(

heres the way i see this. they just gave profit or lose numbers, they didn't give the numbers on how they got there. an nfl team is just like any other business. the owner can say his team is losing money, and he can prove it. then you dig a little deeper at where all the money he brought in went. in those numbers is the compensation for employees. the team could be losing money, but these guys could be writing paychecks to themselves and their family members for very large sums of money

kind of like when a bank or other large company goes under and thousands of people lose their jobs, but the ceo gets a 20 million dollar bonus for that year

same old shit, different rich assholes trying to pull it off

oh well, the lockout is on as of midnight eastern. starting to sound like you can kiss the 2011 season goodbye

[Tarlam!]

Well, it was clear all along the NFLPA weren't going to budge. Neither were the owners. They should have started the litigation process immediately after the SB. At least I credit the owners, though, in showing something in the way of good faith. At the same time, they should have nothing to hide IMHO.

I think the players should have taken the deal that was on the table for two years for stability's sake and got a concession that negotiations for a long term agreement under the current labor talks format be ongoing during that period. I think the players blew it short term.

[HarveyWallbangers]

at least they won't be selling merchandise out in public

You talkin' to me?

[rbaloha1]

[QUOTE=Tarlam!;582793]Well, it was clear all along the NFLPA weren't going to budge. Neither were the owners. They should have started the litigation process immediately after the SB. At least I credit the owners, though, in showing something in the way of good faith. At the same time, they should have nothing to hide IMHO.

Dude its the owners that canceled the previous agreement. The owners are bad losers.

[channtheman]

The slave accommodations these days are an OUTRAGE!

No kidding. Only ONE Tennis court and NO go kart track?

[Tarlam!]

Dude its the owners that canceled the previous agreement. The owners are bad losers.

I'm aware of the situation, but frankly, there are no winners and everybody is a loser. As I've said, I understand what the players require and why and I am suspicious about the owners' refusal to open their books. But the offer was a decent working basis to guarantee football, avoid losing fans/revenue and be a foundation for serious progressive negotiations.

[Lurker64]

Dude its the owners that canceled the previous agreement. The owners are bad losers.

Cancelling the last CBA was in no way malicious. The expired CBA included language wherein either party could decide to end it up to two years early. Invoking that clause means nothing other than "we would prefer to work out a new deal" which the owners clearly attempted to get over these past few weeks. Attempts by the league to cast the ownership's opting out of the CBA early as somehow injurious to the players or otherwise a bad thing are simply blatant attempts to court public opinion.

heres the way i see this. they just gave profit or lose numbers, they didn't give the numbers on how they got there. an nfl team is just like any other business. the owner can say his team is losing money, and he can prove it. then you dig a little deeper at where all the money he brought in went. in those numbers is the compensation for employees. the team could be losing money, but these guys could be writing paychecks to themselves and their family members for very large sums of money

Well, the reason for not opening the books is simple: it would accomplish nothing. Opening the books would give the players a bunch of things to throw back in the owners faces, which are absolutely commonplace in large companies but would seem excessive to random people on the street. The other problem is that, in the court of public opinion, all profit is indefensible. No matter how big a company you are, if you make any amount of profit that seems large to the layperson, you can get called out as greedy. The PA and the league would never be able to come to an agreement on "how much profit is enough", since for an employer no amount of profit is enough and for an employee any profit is too much.

If the league had reason to believe that disclosing their financials would actually get the union to budge, and not blow up in their faces then they likely would have done so. This fundamentally comes down to the fact that the two sides absolutely didn't trust each other (let's face it, Goodell and Smith are slimy lawyers, Owners are rich assholes, and Players are idiots), so the league simply believed that the union wouldn't budge no matter how much financial data they got.

[mraynrand]

I tend to blame the owners, but this is just plain retarded. Didn't we leave shit like this behind when Obama was elected? This gets my retard seal of approval.

Harvey, I've asked nicely time and again for you not to use my picture. Isn't this a violation of the most sacred of all Ratrules? No personal information. Just use a picture of Adam Sandler instead.

[mraynrand]

Goodell and Smith are slimy lawyers, Owners are rich assholes, and Players are idiots...

Goodell is a self-important stuffed shirt, Smith is a raging sociopath, and most owners and players are rich and spoiled megalomaniacs/athletes. I'm on the side of the loyal fans, and the former players who are beat all to hell and got nothing. The rest can go F themselves.

[Patler]

Cancelling the last CBA was in no way malicious. The expired CBA included language wherein either party could decide to end it up to two years early. Invoking that clause means nothing other than "we would prefer to work out a new deal" which the owners clearly attempted to get over these past few weeks. Attempts by the league to cast the ownership's opting out of the CBA early as somehow injurious to the players or otherwise a bad thing are simply blatant attempts to court public opinion.

Well, the reason for not opening the books is simple: it would accomplish nothing. Opening the books would give the players a bunch of things to throw back in the owners faces, which are absolutely commonplace in large companies but would seem excessive to random people on the street. The other problem is that, in the court of public opinion, all profit is indefensible. No matter how big a company you are, if you make any amount of profit that seems large to the layperson, you can get called out as greedy. The PA and the league would never be able to come to an agreement on "how much profit is enough", since for an employer no amount of profit is enough and for an employee any profit is too much.

If the league had reason to believe that disclosing their financials would actually get the union to budge, and not blow up in their faces then they likely would have done so. This fundamentally comes down to the fact that the two sides absolutely didn't trust each other (let's face it, Goodell and Smith are slimy lawyers, Owners are rich assholes, and Players are idiots), so the league simply believed that the union wouldn't budge no matter how much financial data they got.

Very true. It's hard to filter fact from fiction in all the news stories, but recent things seem to point to an unreasonableness from the players:

- supposedly the owners agreed to release unaudited financial information to an independent third party accounting firm, who would then issue a report to the players about the owners claims. The players rejected it, wanting all details in front of their own biased eyes, just like the owners biased eyes. Generally, an independent third party is the way to breach gaps such as this.

- apparently on Friday the players demanded 10 years of data immediately to secure another extension for negotiations. I believe they originally asked for 5 years. Upping demands at a critical time assures that no compromise will occur.

- Hunter Hillenmeyer, who apparently has been involved in the negotiations, criticized the owners for not offering a counter proposal when the players rejected the owners first proposal. It is never wise to negotiate by yourself. A proposal from one side generally is countered by a proposal from the other side, not a second proposal from the side making the initial offer.

I think the players are right were they wanted to be all along, in Federal court.

[SkinBasket]

Stand-up and applaud the players for doing what is right.

LOL. No one is doing what is right you silly dipstick.

If what red reported about the owners offering to split the difference is true, then at least they made the only honest effort in the negotiations. Not very impressive, but better than what the union pulled, which is exactly what the owners suspected they were doing and exactly what the communist NLRB was never going to do anything about.

[gbgary]

i'm not worried much. they'll be playing on schedule. since the owners aren't getting the tv money they thought they were going to get they'll make sure it gets done in time. like jerry jones said yesterday, he didn't build that stadium to have it sit empty. he's got money troubles and he's a big voice in that room.