With Settlement, Union, Retirees Preach Unity
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Saturday, June 6, 2009
In a small meeting room at the top of the National Press Club, there were smiles yesterday morning. Men who had for years shouted at one another through legal briefs and glowered across courtrooms shook hands and spoke of a new day. With the formal announcement of a settlement of a $28.1 million judgment that a group of retired players won last year against their union, a hope lingered that a crack in the NFL Players Association could be healed.
The union's new executive director, DeMaurice Smith, used words like "brotherhood" to describe a healing he expects to take place between a large and vocal group of retired players who felt the previous leader, Gene Upshaw, had abandoned them.
"We're one team, one locker room, one voice," Smith said in announcing the settlement, which will be for about $26 million pending approval of the U.S. District Court in San Francisco, which made the ruling last November.
The lawsuit, brought by a group of former players led by former Green Bay Packers star Herb Adderley, alleged that the union's marketing arm, Players Inc., kept them from sharing in licensing deals. The players' union appealed the ruling in February, a move that further drove a wedge between the union and former players.
Relations began to change when Smith was elected in March to lead the union, Adderley's attorney, Ronald Katz, said yesterday.
"Gene was an intimidator," Katz said of Upshaw, who died last August. "He thought he could intimidate everyone. I think the union is going to be run in a more businesslike fashion."
Katz said he had been negotiating with the union for two months to reach a settlement on the lawsuit and avoid an appeal, which he said would have been "a declaration of World War II" between the retired players and the union. He said that once Smith was chosen to lead the union, he was sure a settlement would be reached.
Smith was less specific about his reasons for settling the suit, saying, "I work for the players and the players made a decision" to settle. It was unclear exactly whether it was the union's executive committee that asked for the settlement or when that request was made to Smith.
Katz didn't care.
"This is a great feeling," he said. "In my business, you don't get to be associated with positive things like this."
