So now what’s the stumbling block keeping us from a 2011 season built upon a semi-regular timeline? We’re hearing that we better have a new CBA deal in place by July 22 or we’re going to suffer a loss of training camp and play schedule…
The players seem to be willing to agree to any deal so long as it’s not something ridiculous in terms of concessions or future disadvantage. But they have found something that trips them up— and that issue is the Owners’ demands to “right of first refusal” which they want in addition to the “Franchise Tag”.
So what is the ”right of first refusal”? Simply put, the owners want to be able to retain a player who has put his contractual time in and then receives a good offer from another club. The team who has prior rights to the player wants the right to MATCH the new offer and retain the player.
How is that different from Franchise Tag? Under the Franchise Tag, a team must pay a player the average of the “top 5” players’ salaries at that position, and that salary-match gets the team the services of that player for only one more year. When it was first introduced, the players loved the Franchise Tag… now, they hate it, because they realize it means they are NOT going to get a long term contract that season—-which every eligible player wants.
So is the “right of first refusal ” a bad thing? Depends on whom you ask. Super Agent Drew Rosenhaus was on ESPN Radio the other day and talked to Colin Cowherd about the subject. According to Rosenhaus, the Owners want to have 3 “R.O.F.R.” Tags to put on players each season, and the NFLPA finds that not only unreasonable, but a deal-breaker…
What is the significance of July 22?— it’s the date many “experts” say is the drop-dead date for keeping regular training camp and preseason game schedules alive…
But some veteran sports journalists and pro football bloggers are throwing in the towel…
Take Detroit’s Big Al Beaton, for example…
Big Al Beaton from Detroit is fed up with the lockout… and is going on strike until the lockout ends and regular NFL activity resumes…
Al Beaton has had it…
Big Al writes football coverage for The Wayne Fontes Experience and does radio as a local Detroit Lions commentator in the Motor City… but to my knowledge, he is the first sports journalist to finally declare a professional boycott of the NFL lockout…
As Big Al says in his own defense:
“To put it simply, I HATE writing about legal matters. And being the lockout and ongoing court cases have been the only real news coming out of the NFL for the past couple of months, I’m not exactly inspired to write. I realize it’s costing me money, and maybe readership, but I refuse to write about something half-assed. That’s exactly what you’d be getting if I were posting constantly during the lockout.”
“Call it taking a stand, call it being frustrated, call it being bored beyond reason with the excruciatingly strung-out negotiating process, call it what you will. I’m just not into the NFL at the moment.”
“That’s a damn shame, as there’s plenty to be excited about when it comes to the Lions (Personally, I cannot wait for the Lions to take the field), but the league did this to themselves. I’m sure I’m not the only one feeling this way.”
“Despite my current ennui, I will admit to backing the players 100% in negotiations with the old white men Owners who are richer than God. NFL owners are holding the game hostage. Taking ownership’s side in this standoff is comparable to rooting for the Roman Lions against the Christians.”
“As the NFL Owners continually claim victory when the courts allow them to keep all football operations shut down, well, that says it all…”
No football is a good thing? Seriously? Well, that seems to be Big Al’s point…Of course both sides want football to resume… but Al seems to be implying that the Owners are the ones currently dragging down the negotiation process. And his personal “labor strike” seems bound to the belief that the Owners are prepared to outlast the players’ will to persist in negotiations if this thing drags on into August and September.
One thing’s for sure: “Right of First Refusal” is NOT Free Agency, and players are not going to budge on this one… Unless the Owners are willing to bend on some of the particulars, this is going to be the issue that holds up things the most in the next week or two…
The players reps have finally figured out that the Owners are intent upon delaying or avoiding many big Free Agent paydays well past the traditional 5- or 6-year timelines after initial signing of a rookie contract… This is not sitting well with players and their agents who already know their playing careers typically average out to only 4 years…
With this new insight in mind, I’ll approach every day this coming week with more “caution” than “optimism”… But I won’t throw in the towel like Big Al Beaton…not just yet…
Big Al is a little bitter. “Yes, I’m aware there’s talk the two sides are getting close,” he says. “But saying things are ‘close’ is relative, depending on your point of view. I’ll actually believe things are ‘close’ when the lockout ends, the Lions recall all their laid-off employees, start negotiating contracts with their draft picks and actively start looking for linebackers and cornerbacks in free agency.”
“You know, FOOTBALL STUFF.”
I get where Big Al is coming from… But I’d still like to think, even if the lockout persists like a stubborn infection well past the prescribed deadline of July 22, we will still find plenty of football topics to keep us busy here at Eagles Eye. They can’t lock us out from learning or collecting information about the sport or the Eagles revised game plan. And that’s the reality—as fans, we are currently required to react to the current circumstances of the league’s impasse, but not overreact…overreaction (such as boycotting the Birds or the NFL in general) would be a futile exercise of self-denial. We want this thing to get resolved in time for a reasonable period of free agency, training camp and preseason games to occur. Boycotting our home team will not make any of those things happen any sooner. We are better advised to stay tuned…and observe. Blame has become irrelevant at this point.
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