Players vs Owners

My optimism failed me. I truly thought that this whole mess would be settled this week. I was wrong, so very wrong.

I don't know much about labor law, and I often struggle to balance a checkbook. However, I follow and love football, and I try to view every situation with an open mind and a bit of logic. I see and hear a lot of people, in fact most people, bashing the players. I don't know if it is because the players are the face of the league, and they see only the players when there is a problem. Some just hate unions, so they hate the players. Some may see a bunch of rich guys fighting over a huge sum of money and flip a coin to decide who to hate. Just gotta hate someone. If people would take the time to look at the situation with an open mind, look beneath the surface, they would see that it has little to do with money. It has a whole lot more to do with the respect that the players seek and the control that the owners want to keep.

About 50 years ago, future Hall of Famer Jim Ringo walked into Vince Lombardi's office, with an agent, seeking to negotiate a contract. Lombardi left the room for a moment, returned to tell Ringo that he had been traded to Philadelphia. Agents and unions were not allowed near the game then, and if the owners had their way it would be the same today. The owners have always relied upon their control over the players. They have banked on their assumption that the players are stupid. They have laughed at the idea that the players have any other desire than to play football for pay. The players will always take what the owners give them and do what the owners tell them. All with a smile. Those may sound like ancient notions, but the current owners maintain them. The owners have worked too hard to build the league to let some uppity players take some of it away.

The chaos now upon us started when the owners backed out of an agreement only two years after agreeing to it. They then negotiated a sweetheart TV deal that would pay them 4 billion even if there was no football in 2011. The owners claim to be in such financial stress that they need an extra billion bucks before the pot of gold is split. The players have asked for proof of this financial need, for the owners to open their books. The owners refusal is a greater issue than the split of the money. The players have asked for the owners to negotiate in good faith, to treat them with respect. In the past two weeks, there were far too many meetings skipped by the owners, deadlines passed, requests ignored. TV reports showed most of the owners showing up for negotiations. They met amongst themselves, 25 miles away from the negotiations, for a couple of hours and jetted off in private planes without ever meeting with players. The owners have shown no respect, and are shocked that the players are out of control.