This may be the best time for players and owners to come to a deal since everything is going right for the NFL in terms of the business of football. Still, there are people who think the players should waiting things out. They shouldn’t rush a deal. It’s very easy to say that the players shouldn’t take the latest collective bargaining offer. There are definitely some sticking points where it’s possible some players may push back. The easy part is saying no. The hard part is explaining what the players would do next if they decided that this deal wasn’t the best they could get. What’s next? What happens if the owners won’t budge from their current position? What happens if there’s a lockout? Let’s take a guess.
Renegotiate
The problem here is that NFLPA DeMaurice Smith seems to think this is a good deal. He wouldn’t have sent the CBA out for a vote if he didn’t feel that this was the best move for the entire union.
It’s tough to figure out what exactly the players who are vocally opposed to the deal want. They haven’t said much other than that they are against the deal. Again, that’s the easy part. It’s easy to say no. It’s not easy to say what they want and then negotiate that into the deal.
Still, it’s a possibility. Maybe the players could go to Smith with a deal they’d accept lined out and everything explicitly stated. Maybe the owners look at it and find it acceptable. Both of those things sound a bit unrealistic, but it’s possible.
The more likely scenario is that the owners start pulling things away in the CBA and players look to get back to the baseline agreement or that players get one of two small wins as part of a renegotiation. The problem with this scenario is that the longer the players wait, the more risk they are taking with owners and then potential business deals.
A renegotiation would have to happen anyway even with the next few options listed. The question is whether that renegotiation puts the players in the best situation or if this iteration of the CBA is the best they can get.
Everyone fends for themselves
In this scenario, no deal is reached, this season is played, and the owners lock out the players going into 2021. This is a very likely situation if the players balk at the current deal and no deal is reached before the start of the 2020 season.
Remember all that talk about the players needing to hoard away cash this past year and the year to come? Well, this would be why. There is a chance a lockout could go deep into 2021. In this case, we would all miss some football. Players would miss some game checks. Owners would sit and wait until there was a break in the union or they may even consider replacement players for the 2021 season.
Players come together to support each other
There was a report that players may be coming together to create a strike fund. In this scenario, players who have a lot of money from long careers and bigger contracts would throw some money into a pot and that money would be disbursed to members of the union who may not be able to make ends meet during a prolonged work stoppage.
This idea sounds great, but it’s fraught with a ton of potential blocking points. Some players may not agree to put in money. After all, they earned that money. There’s no reason for them to support the members of the union who either never had a ton of cash to begin with or weren’t fiscally responsible. Players who did through in money would need a mechanism of reimbursement. That’s not exactly an easy situation — unless the players who are throwing in money into the fund don’t plan on getting their money back which is probably a non-starter. Would this fund pay out players in some type of stepped payment? Would some players get more than others based on time-served in the league? Even if the fund reached $100 million dollars there are almost 1700 active roster players and that number gets up to 2000. That’s $50,000 per player. The issues are obvious, and we didn’t even discuss who would run the fund and paying the people who need to make sure things run smoothly.
The XFL
At least there’s an alternate league. Players could take deals with the XFL that have outs in their contracts. The problem is the NFLPA would either have to be dissolved — which would kind of make it hard to renegotiate a deal — or the union would have to give an out to players on some sort of temporary basis. The legal ramifications are far too complicated to even start to address now.
Still, the XFL is an option for a quick paycheck. Players would likely want to make sure they have an out in their XFL contract. The XFL might not want to shell out the money, but having NFL players on rosters will surely help with television viewership and sponsorships even if it’s temporary.
There will be a ton of lawyers if this happens.
Players run league
This came up briefly when there looked like there would be an NBA labor war back in the day. Essentially the players would run the league and create a traveling circus. They’d go from city to city and it would be a true player-run and player-owned situation. The money goes directly to the players. The owners lose. Everyone wins.
This idea always sounds good in theory, but it’s almost impossible to execute. First, the player-league would have to staff up incredibly quickly. People in the sports world would have to leave comfortable jobs for the chance that this league takes off. After a staff is put into place, players would have to find places to play. There’s a slight problem there since the NFL owners own all the big football stadiums in the country. Teams could play at smaller venues, but that leads to lower ticket revenues. There simply aren’t that many stadiums big enough that don’t have ties to powerful NFL owners. Then the player-league would have to come to multiple television deals. That sounds simple. Except, we don’t know how the distribution companies will react. Let’s say they come to a deal, but then if/when the NFL makes a comeback, the league holds a grudge. That’s not good for business. The same issue can arise for coaches, sports business professionals, and anyone else who supports the movement. Let’s be honest, these NFL owner billionaires aren’t exactly the type of people to forgive and forget. Getting on their bad side isn’t smart since they have a ton of money, power, and connections on their side.
It’s tough to create a league when there is no venues, no television deals, no staff, and no money backing it. Again, this always sounds like a great idea until the machinations of creating an upstart league owned by players is thought out.
