Owners May Revisit NFL Labor Issues

A little over two years ago, the NFL tiptoed to the precipice of labor strife for the first time in two decades, then backed away when commissioner Paul Tagliabue persuaded the league's 32 owners to avoid a confrontation with the players' union and approve a settlement that included a higher-than-ever salary cap and bolstered revenue-sharing among teams.

The act was the last of significance for Tagliabue, who retired. But even on the March 2006 day when the owners voted, 30 to 2, to approve the labor settlement, it was clear that not all of the problems in that unusually combative set of negotiations had been solved. The owners had chosen labor peace but really hadn't resolved differences -- among themselves or with the union.

Now the issues are about to be revisited.

The labor settlement extended the collective bargaining agreement with players through the 2012 season; it kept the salary cap system in place through the 2011 season. But it also contained a reopener clause that enables either side to terminate the deal early. The first of the two early termination deadlines is Nov. 8, and Gene Upshaw, executive director of the NFL Players Association, said he expects the owners to notify the union by then that they're ending the labor deal early. Such notification would make the 2009 season the final one in the deal with a salary cap and would leave the agreement expiring after the 2010 season. It could set the stage for a labor showdown and even a possible work stoppage in 2011.

"I think they're more dug in than they were the last time," Upshaw said of the owners in a telephone interview last week. "They've basically said they want changes and they're going to do the early opener. There's no doubt in my mind that's where this is headed. We haven't had any formal discussions about their position, but what I've gathered is they don't like the deal."

Upshaw is right about the owners' dissatisfaction with the deal, which guarantees players 60 percent of an expanded pool of revenue known as "total football revenues" under the salary cap.

"It's too expensive for the clubs," the owner of one NFL team said this week, speaking on the condition of anonymity because he didn't want to be seen as provoking a fight with the union. "It's a bad deal. A lot of people realize that now."

When the owners gather in Palm Beach, Fla., on March 30 for the annual league meetings, the main focus is likely to be another issue: NFL Commissioner Roger Goodell's proposed crackdown on cheating in the aftermath of the videotaping scandal involving the New England Patriots. But the labor issues almost certainly will be discussed, and they will take on increasing significance and urgency as the November deadline nears. Upshaw said he expects to receive official notification from owners after their regularly scheduled meeting in the fall.

Upshaw said he believes that the owners, if they reopen the labor deal, will give strong consideration to a lockout of the players in 2011.

"It's obvious that's what they'll try to do," Upshaw said. "If we were the ones saying we're going to terminate early, we'd have to consider a strike. [But] it's not us. We have no intention of terminating."

But before the players would allow themselves to be locked out, Upshaw said, they likely would decertify the union -- a legal maneuver that, in the view of union officials, would prevent a lockout because it could expose the owners to an antitrust lawsuit by the players.

"There's no secret there," Upshaw said, then added of the overall labor situation: "All of this is a little premature. All it does is tee things up for what's coming. November is not really a deadline. The deadline really is once we get to an uncapped year. There are two things I can't sell to the players: I can't sell to the players that they should take less [money] so the owners can make more, and I can't sell going back to a salary cap once there isn't one."

Under voting rules established by the owners in the 2006 labor settlement, it would take a three-quarters vote of the teams to keep the collective bargaining agreement going beyond the Nov. 8 reopener deadline. That makes it far easier for owners to reopen the deal than if they'd required a three-quarters vote to exercise the reopener clause.

The 2006 settlement included a revenue-sharing deal designed to transfer $895 million from high-revenue franchises to low-revenue teams over six years. Several owners of lower-revenue clubs said then that the additional funds wouldn't be enough to offset increased operating costs caused by the heftier salary cap, which has a player payroll minimum for each team as well as a maximum. The Buffalo Bills' Ralph Wilson and the Cincinnati Bengals' Mike Brown were the only owners to vote against the 2006 settlement, but some owners say opposition to the deal has grown.

Upshaw said players won't agree to a reduction in the salary cap and owners can't justify claims of hardship in an industry in which annual revenue, he said, soon will approach $9 billion.

"They know exactly what they agreed to," Upshaw said. "They just don't want to pay the players what they agreed to pay them. They want the players to give back so they can make more, and that's a non-starter. I can't sell that to the players. What we're talking about is an industry that's doing well and that's going to continue to do well. . . . Anyone who looks at the numbers knows they [the owners] can't make the case this deal isn't working."