Let's all hold hands and pray together on the discussion of the NFL Collective Bargaining Agreements (CBA) and hope for the very best, a positive outcome. The NFL and its league is one of the richest enterprises in the expensive sports industry, a profitable profession in which team and players prosper by getting richer annually as owners attempt to lock out these great athletes.
All of this makes the average fan cringe, worried about the unknown status of football in the NFL, curious to know if the sport can be saved in time for the start of the regular-season. The corruption looms ever so quickly, if ever, the worst plight to create dreaded tumultuous, a modern era battered in poor economic times, a scary recession that bruise America's identity, tortures the everyday workers as unemployment rates continue to rise to an all-time high.
So here are labor negotiators in the middle of a tussle over money, the least expected worry for a professional athlete of the NFL or their owners pocketing huge bucks, when other parts of the world are fighting for their lives or the next meal. The first thing we need to know, as America citizens worshipping the lovable sport of football, one that our citizens adore each season for the fun it exposes, is that we'll have a lockout by next season all because of stupidity and greediness.
That alone, takes away from the emotions of football, but even more importantly, it slaughters the integrity with its rampant contract disputes whenever someone is disgruntled in a fuss immensely over money. It sounds like two women fighting over the same man in a jilted relationship, infatuated over the dude to a point where it provokes ugliest, a similar dilemma in the NFL today, easily ridiculed for the inability of two parties to negotiate.
Has it ever dawn upon NFL commissioner Roger Goodell, an intolerant and enforcer when he acted like the NFL Sheriff, that the richest league is now smeared in shambles, no longer a business with much regard or credibility? As of recently, the federal mediator overseeing the NFL's labor talks acknowledged Thursday that "some progress" has been made in the negotiations between the league and player's union.
Ready, for the bad news?
For the parties on both sides "very strong differences remain," which tell us the NFL and union are nowhere near a unanimous agreement, let alone successful deals for the future to protect not only the image, but also the health of players and satisfy the superstars with riches, apparently a bad concept to sadly harm its reputation. The pernicious altercation has abruptly gone viral, although many negotiators are in denial and seriously has the assumption that the two parties can strike a deal, maybe not before the NFL Collective Bargaining Agreement expires in three weeks, but maybe by September.
It could be argued, wrangling through the medium of troubles for which both sides have expressed urgency and the realm of responsibility to resolve a matter having much of an influence on the moribund federation, that the NFL can confront a work stoppage until next season arrives. If so, in terms of an imbroglio, there won't be a 16-game season, particularly when the NFL is fully in a flux each week for the complexity to shamefully pollute a league that gained monopoly among other sporting associations.
With awful priorities of this situation, including the unsympathetic creed of a player's health status or even reducing the risk of concussions, the NFL can't afford a lockout. A blind person or even a fool realizes that the state of the league is thrust in the worst circumstances, demolished by the lamest difficulty, probably worse than the 1987 stoppage. The distress of this ordeal is real simple, and as long as we could conceive that it's all about profit while the NFL couldn't care less about its fans, the better off we'll be as human beings putting our heart and souls on football, a remedy for dismissing the scary thoughts of reality sometimes.
Turns out, there are plenty of fools, idiots and morons in command within the player's union and the NFL, inclined to cost themselves huge profit and doubtlessly lose out on entire season, a yearly routine that hypnotized football addicts. The folks didn't mind spending largely on tickets or purchasing the NFL Sunday Ticket premium package on DirecTV, dropping unbelievable bucks to witness and follow their favorite teams. Which brings me to the question, will they care now?
Good question.
If you believe it, after all, a short lockout most likely will not hurt the NFL, simply because it's the most popular professional sport league in the nation. As it stands, it won't draw confrontation and will mercifully protect its reputation by the viewers and the advantages it collects in revenue.
Trust me, I know what the hell I'm talking about. My point is that the NFL should survive, no matter of the aftereffect in the upcoming weeks, no matter if the league endures a painful stoppage, particularly if it only proceeds into the early weeks of the regular-season.
The issue in football is that markets and sponsorships are endangered, jobs are at high risk of being lost, and least importantly, fans are out of luck, destitute of taking in an emotional high or cheering for the adorable team under this tough economy.
Imagine if there's no season, no playoffs, no Super Bowl? If this does happen, the sports world in my eyes and the eyes of professional football is dull, pretty much dead until the return of NFL is competent to reclaim attention. All the revenue flows perfectly in the NFL, but topples in nearly every other professional sport, evidence that we live in an unbalanced world.
When it comes to the unfolding fuss between two parties, as the union anticipates a lockout and remains un-confident with the CBA deal expiring after March 3, the nightmare is complex and mind-boggling. Mostly, from what it seems amazingly, the NFL and player's union is wasting energy and generating tension that happens to be very intense over innocuous affairs, like the argument pertaining to "total revenue." If the people in charge were smart, they'd try to fix the problem before it nauseates the most enthusiastic fans, upsets the fans and lower the chance of viewers, not by a large percentage but somewhat.
When the deal expires, which is only six weeks away, the owners are destined to chafe players during a hideous, revolting lockout, one that can last forever if no one talks this problematic issue over release the destruction it has caused. Meanwhile, this entire scenario, tearing down the omen and the fans faith of the NFL, is a sign of what to expect during the summer. There'll be no free agency, no minicamps and, probably, no football on Sundays, after players have dealt with a decade of ill-treatment from league and union, without any love in return.
What upsets me, and what should upset you as well, is that this disagreement is because of money. It comes as no surprise, not in the age of hard times, not in the age of wealthy owners, not in the age of greed and survival, and the players earn mega dollars.
Goodell said in an open letter addressing the fans earlier this month."Yes, NFL players deserve to be paid well. "Unfortunately, economic realities are forcing everyone to make tough choices, and the NFL is no different."
In this age, winning doesn't matter, not even getting to the playoffs instead the money is worth speaking about. The players, many of whom are wealthy enough to support their families and fortune to stand out as a top-notch star in the league, aren't exposing otherworldly talent like before but are desperately trying to demand more cash from a profitable league. This has pissed off owners greatly, and clearly, the bosses believe roughly 60 percent of revenue the players earn is undeserving, noting greater cost and economic downturns, nonetheless the owners offered it and paid the players from their own wallets.
If you believe every headline, such as the exaggerated fairy tales that sometimes produces a buzz, the league has attempted to adjust the profit paid out in salaries by 9-18 percent. In a sense, the union isn't buying into the financial troubles, requesting for the league to prove its financial obstacles.
Cowboys owner Jerry Jones invested $1.1 billion in stadium creation and built Cowboys Stadium, but he's one of the advocates in which stadium expenses will be constituted into the next collective bargaining agreement. Not great for the NFL, as of which none of this is pretty.
While the league is fighting to avoid a potential stoppage, as the mania stem from the unhappy fans malcontent about the proposed 18-game season and claims the league is reluctant to compensate players for playing tow extra games, it's assured that the NFL is on the way to a lockout.
That's not soothing. That's terrifying. That's not pretty. That's ugly, very ugly. That's not glee. That's terror. They aren't lying to you, when they say money is the root of all evil.
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