Hplarrm

Ironically, I think the fact that everyone uses Wonderlic is more likely a demonstration in the real world that standardized testing simply has real limits in it usefulness for accurately assessing players. The NFL is such a competitive league on the field that even someone as successful as Belicheat was deemed it necessary to quite transparently break the rules to get any advantage he could over the opposing team. If a standardized test was so great a tool for player assessment, one can rest assured that one would consistently see teams trying out some new fangled standardized test (the Hyperlic or the doublebackflipalic as they sought an even better test for assessing players. Instead, I think the Wonderlic hits the outside of the envelope in terms of what atandardized testing can tell you (which likely is not much as there are simply no absolute correlation between Wonderlic scores and success in the NFL- if there were then Tom Brady and RoboQB would be near the top of the Wonderlic scores and Fitzpatrick would score in the middle or slightly above average if you felt good about him that day). Overall. even when the Wonderlic does tell you something like Fitzy is bright, well he went to Harvard so no surprise here and Vince Young is as dumb as a stump. You really need a standardized test to tell you this. Then why is it so widely used? Part of the answer is found in merely being able to ask the question. It is widely used because everyone else is using it. Why not take readily available info and use it when the other guy is using it? The actual question is how are others using it and the answer is that it seems to be used to confirm pre-existing notions (whether intelligent notions or not and this is where the racism issue comes in). It also provides a similar standard for comparing QB in different years (he is another Jim Kelly, dumb as a stump but boy can he run an offense) which is a stock in trade of draft assessment. The real answer is that standardized testing is a pretty dead letter in terms of assessing players as it does not appear to be worth the time to change the discriminatory practice which defines the CBA.

This extremely helpful compared to the fact-free opinions that often populate this board. I am curious if you have perspectives on a couple of other issues: 1. I really appreciated the factoid about this year's draft being grandfathered in under the the CBA (this point and the contestable question of to what extent very old CBA agreements still hold shows how silly the claims made by some that now that the sides have failed to agree the old CBAs are null and void with no impact- this view is simply wrong based what have seen). I get it that the NFL and NFLPA have agreed to let this one go ahead even without an agreement. However, my sense is that the truly aggrieved party in this trust violation is not the NFLPA and the NFL, but actually is the rookies to be drafted. The limited anti-trust exemption the players and owners operate under is actually a conspiracy which not only sets salary levels of players but actually forces rookies to negotiate with one and only one team. This strikes me as an abridgment of individuals rights to sign personal services contracts with whomever they judge to reach an agreement with in our capitalist society. It obviously would be hard for a rookie job applicant sue his potential employers, but quite frankly all rules are off right now without an agreed upon CBA. Rookies like Quinn are already making noises that they are operating as individuals rather than as sheep. The fact is that if you are a likely top ten draft talent you are going to do fine without regard to whether 31 owners are pissed at you. In addition, it is clear that the NFLPA is already talking to rookies and their agents and depending on what the NFLPA's strategy is on this, grandfathering in the draft is fine but also encouraging or at least co-operating with lawsuits against the draft without the NFLPA fig leaf could work to the players benefit. How do you see this possibility (even if improbable it only takes one person to file a suit). 2. The thing I think some folks miss in analyzing this is that they are more wedded to their doctrinal views than to past real life events. They are so wedded to ideas like the traditional employer/employee relationship they are considering this this whole CBA fight in that context only. While past actions do not completely predict future events they are not unreasonable indicators. In the past two CBA negotiations the NFLPA has developed out-of-the box proposals based on their assertion of partnership with the team owners rather than simple employer/employee relationships. They have run with their third way thinking on these negotiations to grasp victory from the jaws of defeat after the replacement player debacle and to basically publicly dictate the terms of the last CBA. My sense is that on this third go round that strategically the NFLPA will be introducing some new strategy not envisioned by the owners whom they have run rings around the last two CBA megotiations. Do you see any new out of the box ways the NFLPA might operate this time around? Thanks

A judgment on this matter is all about outcome. You are right to qualify this as so far since the real answer is it is too early to tell. Given that the situation has come to loggerheads and degraded its hard to give him credit for doing a good job however. The irony is that as in any negotiation between two sides which both have a lot of leverage you are not going to get an outcome until the situation gets very bad and one side blinks. His job is really tough to do well at since in reality he has the bosses who hired him and whom he answers to on paper (the owners)but also the bosses who really are the game we love to watch (as folks are beginning to articulate more this fight is really over the players asserting themselves as the bosses). In the end, it all tends to be about the money and Tagliaboo-boo asserted himself on the side of the real bosses and argued/forced the team owners to accept the most recent CBA because even though it delivered a significant majority of the total assets to the arguably majority partners in this arrangement it still brought the team owners 39.5% of money thant the NFL produced under the pretend free-market it had until the NFLPA decert threat. In the end, Goodell will have done a good job if he continues the NFL as an entity that brings in goo-gobs of money to the folks who hired him (team owners) AND the folks who really are the game (the players). Its in the balance right now but unfortunately to get to equilibrium it has to flirt with death.

Agreed. The only general rule for healthcare (or more accurately labeled illness care in the US) is that there are no general rules. Every individual case is an individual case that is placed in some broader category (where in theory there is equal treatment of those in the same category)but when it gets down to comparing what happens by rule to one individual may be completely different than what happens to another individual. In American society if you are with and/or well to do then you can get a whole bunch of stuff in terms of illness care but on the other hand if you are not well to do and/or unable to manipulate the system AND you are ill you get screwed. NFL players actually are a great oddity since generally (by US standards even PS players make above the norm particularly when one considers you 50K is for part time work, food is regularly thrown at you, and from what the couple of friends of mine who have led the NFL life tell me you do not have to pay for a drink if you do want to) they make well above the norm. However, they often are sheep who have been coddled most of their lives and told when to eat, when to sleep, and what to do every waking moment. There is a talented tenth who tend to lead the other players but for the most part the big health care advantage they have is that they are young and physically fit. However, on the third hand, they have ridiculous illness care demands as they subject their bodies to high impact blows all the time. The bottomline is that comparing them to some alleged norm of health care for a journeyman carpenter really has little to do with the real world.

I assume you also realize that the agreed to current CBA had a finite ending a few years from now, BUT the owners decided to trigger a re-opener which forced the contract to be renegotiated right now. To simply claim that both sides agreed to a deal where the CBA ceased to exist right now is an incomplete rendering of the truth at best). Right now the NFL/NFLPA relationship is one governed by past reality within the context of US Labor Law. It seem far more radical and counter to reality to try to pretend that the past revenue sharing agreement i null and void and one should act like it never happened. It clearly is not the current contractual arrangement but it did happen and reality is going to relevant to what happens in the future. The current owner/player relationship is based on its own reality and this relationship has far more in common with traditional entertainment contractor relationships than it does with traditional employer/employee relationship as one would find in a steel or auto plant' This view is also incorrect as it is certainly possible for the team owners and the players to have any relationship they both agree to have. They can choose to divide up profit and risk anyway they want to. In general the owners were willing in the last two CBAs to first divide to the players advantage a designated portion of the gross and then divide the entire gross the last time rather than actually compete in a free market for players talent. The decert threat put the team owners over a barrel in that even though the players offer not only delivered the players a vastly larger % of the total take, it assured labor peace such that the actual cash source, the TV nets were willing to give the owners higher profits than they would get in a combative owner/employee relationship. I do not think it is valid at all as he is comparing apples and oranges. The NFLPA is not demanding at all for team owners like Mr. Ralph to account for profits which they make from the NFL. In fact it would be stupid for their goals to get deluged with team owner personal spending habit data. You may have a prurient interest in how Steve Johnson spends his personal cash but this has nothing to do with the contractual issues at hand. So Edwards Arm's proposal is invalid as it misses the point. What the players want is access to the team books to measure the profit loss statements which is a very different thing than an individuals spending habits. An understanding of what is fair or not fair about this is that the team owners were essential to the process of creating the NFL as they were willing to take the risk and provide capital, and manage the product when the NFL started. However, now they are simply a middle man who really adds to the cost of producing the product which in fact can be replaced by numerous sources of capital. The NFLPA however seems to recognize that it does not serve their interest to kill the current owners. They actually maximize the money they would get by fostering competition and creating a parallel NEWFL with the teams following the successful Packer model. The team owners are simply redundant now from my perspective or do you have the hots for or some entertainment fro, Jerry Jones. Snyder or Mr. Ralph?

+1

I agree with the facts you lay out being a key to understanding this, but these facts point away from looking to the draft for your franchise QB. Specifically< Young- Drafted by TB and run out of town to SF. Elway- Drafted by Indy but he also left town to the Broncs by trade Favre- Drafted by TB and run out of town Warner- FA acquisition recruited from his previous job as a boxboy at a Walmart Brady- Drafted yep but in the 6th round. Big Ben- Finally a QB drafted in the first who paid off immediately for the team which drafted him Mannings- Eli acquired through a trade, Peyton finally pays off for the team which drafted him Brees- acquired as an FA Rogers- a draft pick does deliver an SB win but again on a timeline a bit too long for the Bills to want to follow. The examples you provide speak clearly to me that the draft is pretty far from the only way to get a franchise QB. In fact when one totals of the various methods of relying on the draft to get your franchise QB is a pretty risky propostion.

I agree we meed a QB to groom, but virtually completely doubt that a 1st round QB choice is going to properly groomed here. This is because: 1. The CW is that a first round pick should be an immediate (or at least first year) starter for the team that picked him. Any QB we picked almost for sure should be sitting and groomed his first year, but in the continual search for a new Jimbo which is why this team often failed is gonna happen again with a highly picked QB. From rushing TC to start before he was ready, tu the Hobert overeachto creating the RJ/DF debacle in search of a franchise QB and so on drafting a QB in the first (or in fact before our fourth pick is like;y destined for disaster. 2. I think taking a friggen 1st rounder is a bigger problem than picking a friggen 6th rounder. Neither likely works but the later pick probably does less damage to this team, I think that this is true in general but if you hava specific name let us know. 3. Those who claim we must draft a franchise QB early in the draft simply choose to ignore the fact that one can acquire a 1st round or high draft pick QB who has been a bust in his first stop and then develop into an SB winner and even HOF worthy QB in his second stop. Start at Drew Brees and work your way back to Steve Young and Brett Favre (with stops in Balt where 1st round pick Dilfer proved capable of QBing a great Ravens D because they focused on D first or two time cuttee Brad Johnson. The key is not to take any highly regarded QB you can get but instead to build the team strategically and pick the right guy without regard to picking a QB high simply to save face.

Ironically, there may already be an answer to your request depending upon under which IRS regs the NFLPA is incorporated. My guess is that like many unions it is a not-for-profit 501 c3. While this would not give you the numbers on how much Ryan Fitzpatrick spent on chicken wings, the NFLPA is not asking for that level of detail about individual owner purchases or even team purchases (in fact those details might interest Oprah, but the NFLPA would reject that level of detail as a distraction from the more general numbers they want declaring the receipts and profits of NFL teams. As a group governed by IRS code 501c3 (or subsections governing other not-for-profit associations, the NFLPA would have its top 5 salaries and what they compensated people for. In addition, above a certain size these books would be audited and the results of the audit in terms of unusual expenditures like large bar tabs made public (for example one of the GOP associations last election got a bunch of press over them running up some significant bar tabs for consultants in Vegas where they were apparently preaching the good quiet life. In addition to these gross figures which the NFL as a profit making entity does not have to release and which the NFLPA does not care about and is not asking for the NFLPA actually does release publicly with the agreement of the NFL the general salaries paid to individual players and even some details of their contract. The parties agreed to this public release as a method of being able to check general salary cap compliance by each team and the MFL. Again, if you are looking for accounting of expenditures and money management by individual players, the NFLPA is not asking for nor does it care about individual expenditures by individual owners. It likely would want some gross accounting of large expenditures by teams and will need these to the extent a team may show limited profits but it turns out that one of their expenses is for something that steers money to the owner and thus away from the cap(ex/ the Bills cannot deduct from their profits payments of several million for singers of the Bills fight song if that singer is Mr. Ralph singing the song in his shower each morning. However. my guess is by law and certainly known by us there is already greater transparency about payments by the NFLPA and to the players as salary than what is required of, given by, or even wanted from the owners by the NFLPA. What the players are saying is that they would be happy to honor and go with the agreement they and the owners made several years ago. The owners through this season into disorder by instead demanding a renegotiation of the deal they agreed to. They then offered up to their agreement partners that they did this because of team owner fiscal losses. When their agreement partners then asked to see the books of their agreement partners, the team owners refused. It looks pretty straight forward to me.

Its worse than the simple "mere" fact that without acquiring two quality starters on D this off-season (OLB and DE)its going to be a very difficult environment for any alleged franchise QB taken with the third pick. It also appears to be likely we need to acquire an RT starter on the OL and also arguably we are this pick-up and a swing guy on OL who allows for an injury or failure to develop by the other youngsters on OL (Bell, Wood, Levitre, the new RT) plus a year to develop chemistry before this alleged franchise QB has an adequate OL in front of him. The math is that we are really looking for 3 quality players from the first three picks. If we devote the #3 to a QB this team then is looking to get 3 quality player from 2 picks. The math does not work flat out if you devote the #3 to QB. Even worse beyond the "new" math of trying to make this work, while the CW that a #3 pick should be a quality player (though glaring examples like Harrington seem to happen every year), the statistical likelihood of a player picked in the 2nd round much less the 3rd drops below 50/50. Just think about it, not only does picking a QB at #3 likely condemn this team to another year of bad run D, but also pushes down by another round simply saving this #3 drafted QB for having to run for his life all the time behind an OL which does not have a player available to be considered for a Bills #3 or even a top 10 pick. It may well not get done as it is necessary to have two teams if you want to make a deal. However, I hope that Carolina grabs Newton or Gabbert as the word the Bills have spread that QB is what they want heightens the potential that someone offers them a trade for extra early picks in exchange for the #3. My dream scenario is that either Newt or Gabby comes off the board wit the first pick and one of the teams with a 4th-10th pick gets do afraid the Bills will take the other QB that they trade us the lower first rounder and a supplemental 2nd rounder and whatever is needed to make the trade value work. We then grab a starting OLB like Miller with the first we traded our #3 pick for, we get a DL player early in the second in a very deep DL draft and we either trade again for more picks or pick up the best RT candidate available with our third choice. I do not see any QB (Ponder, Kampernick, or whomever) being worth more than a more critical pick-up before the 4th. I hope there is a run on QBs which begins quick as we simply have too many holes to fill without multiple early picks. A QB at #3 just makes the math worse and likely guarantees that when this rookie QB is forced into the starting line-up without the year on the bench all QBs besides Luck likely need this year its gonna be bad.

Rather than flame away, I am one who definitely fully agrees with the above statement. Thus I think: 1. Led by the same high profile players who filed suit against the NFL (and whom are certainly going to make huge dollars to play football any virtually any case) I would open bidding by the networks for a new league. The new league is actually more than likely fail after a few seasons like the USFL or WFL, or perhaps the significantly smaller case will happen like with the AFL who essentially became recognized full partners in the NFL) but success or failure of this league is not the point. The point in all these cases is that they raised salaries for the players and increased the total membership of the players union. The formation of the NEWFL featuring high profile players like Manning, Brees, Brady and whatever other stars initially to stoke bidding for the games would generate profits even though smaller than the NFL would not have to be split 60/40 with the owners and generate huge cash gains for these stars. 2. The NEWFL in addition to these highly paid stars would also need a truckload of average players and special teamers who would get lesser though still enormous wealth from the NEWFL. 3. The NFLPA would immediately recertify itself as the bargaining agent for NFL players as well as push to be named managing operator for the NEWFL. The first reaction of various juvenile folk will be that the NFL should reject the MFLPA as the bargaining agent. However, this is not the employers choice if players decide whoever will represent them. Further, any effort to reject the players chosen representative would result in the NFL conspiring against the rights of individual if it attempts to do things inherent in the draft like barring the ability of adults to sign contracts or simply force individuals to negotiate with one and only one employer in the industry. 4. The NEWFLPA can choose among several options for managing the teams such as: A. My personal favorite is to have the 16 or less teams in the NEWFL be owned by the people of municipalities such as the model used by the Green Bay Packers for their successful business on field and off. B. See if there are enough Pagulas, Golisanos, or rich folk overseas (Osana bin Laden no but some Saudis maybe yes) who are willing to sign something like the current CBA, C. It might end up being a little rollerball like in terms of corporate ownership but right now we have a job crisis because tons of corporations are sitting on cash rather than investing. D. Something else I have not thought of yet. 5. The goal of this whole exercise is not to kill the NFL but simply force them to be actual buisnessfolk who compete in the good ol American capitalist system. Even chopped down by many high profile stars and a bunch of ST and average players jumping ship you want the NFK to remain strong enough to compete with the NEWFL and drive up salaries. The players who remain with the NFL and in fact the NFL itself is pretty desperately going to need a partnership with the NFLPA to sort and negotiate through the leftover and new TV contracts, stadium deals, etc. While this new world is gonna be a tough one for the Bills, actually its previously developed 45,000+ fan base, deals and relationships with local companies and connections to the history of the A and NFL become significant assets (or at worse the basis for the NFL to try to defend the Toronto eyeballs with the Buf-Tor Bills. I agree with you completely that this is a free country and may the best person win with any entertainment business. I think neither the owners nor the players are owed or have a right to jack beyond what they contractually agreed to, I say bring on the replacement owners. The game will be better for it!

My guess is that the big money guys probably view the small market guys generally as a necessary evil and they realize that the big money to be found comes from using the small markets as an ally in the battle to get money back from their uppity workers. Specifically, Kraft likely looks at Mr. Ralph and sees two guaranteed wins a year for the past decade and Snyder looks at the Bills as the thing which along with Detroit cushions him from being the worst in the league. If only we were that important in their eyes beyond being an annoyance.

The owners playing the Ghadafi (or Quadaffi, or Daffy Duck or however he newsmedia is spelling it today) is an interesting comparison. Given how the owners caved when confronted with actually having to compete in a free market after the first decertification, and then given how they caved again when their own hired minion Tagliaboo-boo argued with them they would be stupid not to sign the current CBA, my sense is there are two immediate precedents for the owners caving when confronted with reality. My sense is that despite the strong feelings expressed by some on this board that the owners have the NFLPA in a hammerlock, that again there are objective signs that the in reality the NFLPA is setting the owners up once again. Specifically: 1. The players maneuvered nicely in putting together the lawsuit against the owners for anti-trust with Brady, Manning, and Brees being lead named plaintiffs. One of the interesting aspects of NFLPA tactics is that a number of African-Americans have been prominent in their leadership roles (Gene Upshaw, Troy Vincent and even TKO Spikes are prominent among what I call the talented tenth who have tended to spend their off-seasons getting classes at Ivy League business schools rather than blinging out like Pac-Man Jones, Sharkey or the 80% or so of NFL athletes or our genetic mutants reinforced with drugs). My sense is that the vast majority of NFL athletes tend to actually be happy to be led by AFL-CIO types who unfortunately tend to be a little plodding in their strategic efforts. The talented tenth appear to be smart enough not only to understand an hire rich smart NY lawyers to develop and sell approaches like the late 80s decert jujitsu that won that CBA, but also capture NFL hired leadership like Tagliaboo-boo to help them seal the deal on the last CBA the owners are trying to renegotiate now. They were also smart enough to work with prominent high profile white athletes like Brady, Manning and Brees as the name plaintiffs which goes quite aways in terms of stopping efforts by the owners to undercut solidarity among the players, Meanwhile folks like Kevin Mawae have been vocal leaders keeping up the legacy of Upshaw. This lawsuit, its organizing and timely filing are objective signs which lead me to believe the same level of planning which saw the lowering of the decert boom in the late 80s is still happening. 2. The active effort to reach out to the rookie draft prospects is also quite interesting. To some degree it shows less of the authoritative organizing used with the building around the elected team player reps and greater commitment to transparency evident under Maurice Smith NFLPA leadership. Their messaging could be stronger but the organizing looks very good. However, I think I see the recognition that the draftees actually have a better legal case charging anti-trust than the existing players (basically by running a draft without a certified player bargaining agent the NFL is forcing rookies to negotiate with one and only one team rather than selling their services to the highest bidder among allegedly competing teams- one could try to claim that the NFL is a single entity amidst numerous competing forms of sports entertainment, however, it seems to be virtual black letter law after the courts ruled against the MLB reserve clause that what the NFL is doing is restraining free trade for individuals by assigning them to one and only one team. The relationship with the draftees is an interesting one for the NFLPA though as they also are quite willing to have a rookie cap if the money goes to the vets and escalators are in place to increase vet salaries, Still the players are clearly anticipating potential points of vulnerability and POTENTIALLY may be setting up for a mega move that benefits them a lot by setting up the competition of a second league which does some same job as the failed USFL and WFL or the successful AFL of bidding up player contracts. At least I know enough to be uncertain as to what is happening, but the most amusing posts on TSW comes from the legends in their own minds who seem to claim they know exactly how this must play out. The team owners made the same mistake of underestimating the talented tenth of players when the NFLPA force the NFL to really take then on as partners in the early 90s, and then arguably the players became majority partners (at least in writing) with the most recent CBA. Why did the owners push to renegotiate this deal when it clearly has delivered them more wealth than could have been imagined under the old pretend capitalist model? I think the answer is that Capts of industry like Mr. Ralph are simply vexed by being forced to be partners with the players and that they are making a push right now to get the player cap share pushed below 50%. The Cornwall piece seems to show that the players view this primarily as a battle to be recognized as partners rather than mere employees. This is the battle which was raging the streets of Cairo, which folks are getting killed over in Bengazi right now and actually has gone on since Robin Hood squarely off against Prince John at least/ It is unclear who will win, but the players won in a walkover the last two times and to see posters simply dismiss them says more about the posters than it does about the situation.

Exactly! Some folks seem to prefer principle over reality. It gets particularly weird when these "principled" folks seem to make up their own version of reality to fit their principles. As Cornwall admits in his piece his opinion on this issue are actually driven by his self-interest. It is folks in the owners camp who seen to consistently pretend that they are motivated by principles when it is really simply self interest which motivates their views and not some alleged principles, The pathetic thing is that many of the most vocal shock troops mouthing the owners line are actually buying a bill of good which actually serves only the owners self-interests and cuts against the little guy. Cornwall does get right though that the real dispute here that given that by written rule the players are not only a partner in the NFL but in fact the majority partner is at the basis of this dispute. The old guard in the NFL team owners simply find it impossible to accept the fact that they are not the main party in charge of the NFL.

Anti-trust exists when the individual teams operate in collusion with each other without the players agreeing to this collusion through a certified bargaining agent. The agent is this case was the NFLPA until it decertified itself. The CBA and labor law gives the union the right to decertify itself as the bargaining agent for the players and all contracts which are specifically written to exist within the context of the CBA are rendered void by this decert is my understanding. The individual teams to have the right to reach a legal agreement with any individual it wants to. However, the do not have the right to collude with each other in setting contracts. The NFL teams cannot act like competitors on the field and then collude with each other in contract negotiations with individual players. It is however settled law that American society will allow for the trust like collusion of the team owners IF the rights of the individual players are protected in a collective bargaining agreement. The NFLPA has not ceased to exist as an entity. Hence the meetings and pronouncement it makes. Individual players choose to pay dues and the NFLPA takes legal and organizing action on behalf of players to meet that contractual agreement. However, what the NFLPA has done is decert itself as a bargaining agent for the players as it is allowed to do under US Labor law and the CBA. It still exists and offers representation of its members perspectives. However, among these services offered is no longer is it a certified bargaining agent. I think the clearest example of NFL trust activities is the draft. The NFL is allowed a limited exemption of anti-trust laws as overtime it has become clear that in order for many sports entertainment businesses to operate they need an orderly method of allocating players known as the draft. America going back to Teddy Roosevelt and the GOP back when they were Republicans had busted trust and cartels of businesses because the trod on the rights of individual and were inefficient economic engines for society. Overtime it became settled law that team owners were actually colluding in a manner which undercut the free market abilities of the individual through collusions like the MLB reserve clause. Though this was flat out unconstitutional, the draft did have utility for operating. The settled legal mandate became its OK to undercut individuals with things like the draft, but society allows it as long as their is a certified players union negotiating salaries and work rules generally. Some posters try to translate what the NFLPA is doing to their jobs and relationship with employers. They are wrong to think of the NFL as a normal employer and the draft is an example why. Lets take three companies and call themIBM, Apple and Microsoft. These employers compete for talent in our system. However, if these or other "normal" employers operated like the NFL does with its limited anti-trust exemption, these computer companies would hold a draft of talented programmers and then the individual programmer would be barred from taking a job with Apple or IBM if Microsoft drafted him. The abtu0tust lawsuit is not the NFLPA suing the NFL its these players whose CBA contracts are now void who are suing the NFL. I actually think it is the college athletes like Gabbert and Newton who really have a case to be made here. The individual teams are colliuding with each other through the draft to assign players to one sole team instead of allowing them to sale their wares to the highest bidder. It un-American!

Possibly bu probably not" 1. His agent will need to spin this for teams as an example of Miller being a manly in your face person who will bring that grit to the field for a team that signs him. While most teams will not buy this, all he needs is for one team to pick him and adopt his spin for their public. My guess is he pisses many off with the suit but he can still sell this if need be. 2. He pretty much can count on NFL teams looking out for their individual self interest rather than trying to make an example of him for the benefit of the league. Right now Kiper has him in the top 10 and if he is still on the board in 10-15 he almost certainly will go to some team which adopts the John Butler line of expressing surprise he was there when they drafted. 3. Miller may be one of the ones among the top 10-15 who reads the players chances as pretty good in this fight. He might be wrong. However, someone who judges the players as having a not unreasonable shot at winning this fight (a judge's decision along the Doty lines in the NFL anti-trust case is a high risk proposition for the owners that could easily happen even those who do not think it will must admit. If the players are actually working to pull off a maneuver like he one they pulled off last time they decertified it may end up that replacement (actually supplementary since the players would do better with competition between owners rather than killing the NFL team owners) owners will be more likely than replacement players. If the owners win in their battle with the players, there still is a reasonable chance Miller cones out smelling like a rose as all he needs is one team to not hold the suit against him. However, if the players win this fight Miller really profits from this suit. It is only the chance that Miller alienates virtually all the teams such that his draft position plummets that he loses big time. This is possible but strikes me as the least likely of these three possibilities.

This actually demonstrates why you do see the current reality as ridiculous and do not seem to understand the way this situation is laying out. The team owner/NFLPA dispute is simply NOT the same situation as you and Vandelay Industries. Thus it is no wonder why your expectations in this case simply do not apply. Consider this description which must more closely fits reality. Your pool is not a pool of applicants but actually are currently providing services and getting checks from Vandelay (do you see right away that your example is wholely different than reality with merely this distiction?) Now add to this the reality that you not only already have a contractual agreement with Vandelay, but the contractual agreement actually delivers you a significant majority of the total revenue garnered by Vandelay. You are not simply an employee, but actually a partner (in fact arguably the majority partner in this enterprise. The simple fact is that the actual cash deliverer for the latex you sell)in reality the fans and the TV networks really could give a rats behind for Vandelay industries, what they really want is your ability to make latex like no one else. Mr. Vandelay is a legend in his own time. He was willing to risk capital to make latex when no one else would. However, the capital risk he took when no one believed in latex has already been paid back many times over. The simple fact is that just as no one would pay any money to watch Mr. Ralph and Al Davis put on shoulder pads and butt heads (though this would be amusingly entertaining once) and they have little desire when they think about it to pay a marked up rate for latex from Vandelay if they can get it from you. Still a deal is a deal and you contractually agreed (lets call your agreement the CBA) that you are going to let Nr. Vandelay for historical reasons to manage delivery of your product, scrape a chunk of money of the top to do this and only then split the total revenue 60-40 your way (not unreasonable at all since the fans come to see you and Mr. Vandelay, Jerry Jones, Dan Snyder or whomever). Even more oddly, even though under the 60/40 arrangement with Mr. Vandelay making far more money than he ever had, he still triggers a re-opener of the contract and demands a new contract that pays you less money than he agreed to pay you. Even stranger, as the party hired to implement the income and outflow of the CBA, he does claim he is losing money but then refuses to let you see the full books governing this income/outflow. Your position in this dispute which Mr. Vandelay has triggered is merely to want to maintain the deal you and Mr. Vandelay made. If you have any dispute with how I have laid out the situation, please tell me as all of this open to interpretation, However, I think it is quite clear that my application of the Vandely example is a lot closer to reality than the situation you lay out. it is no wonder you find this situation ridiculous if you accept the example you give as describing the current dispute.

The potential draftees have an even stronger case and reason to be pissed at the team owners than the NFLPA, The rookie salary cap CBA renegotiation demand of the team owners will cost these men specifically. The draftee leverage is pretty small here as suing your future paymaster is not a good recipe for getting paid big bucks, but the 10-15 have the maximum leverage as teams have already demonstrated that if a top 5 choice were to drop he goes not much further down than the top 10 (creating a strong incentive for the top 5 to just pick him). The draftees have a stronger case against the NFL than the NFLPA actually because the individual is the one who gets his rights totally trampled on if the NFL drafts him and essentially denies this individual the right to sell his services to highest bidder because the NFL has colluded amongst team owners to assign him to one team. Its as though Apple, IBM and Microsoft rather than bidding against each other for college educated programers, instead colluded with each other to publicly assign these graduates to only one company. This is what anti-trust is all about. In fact, I am quite happy if I am in the top 10-15 to see the NFLPA decertify as the draft itself does not have the fig leaf of MFLPA agreement to hide behind and a non-draft system which on the face of it is the only constitutional way to operate allows the top 10-15 to negotiate their own personal contracts. The last thing the team owners want is an actual free market and this is why decertification is a powerful tool which has really won the NFL partnership rather than mere employment from the team owners.

A finding against the NFL in this case would in no way: 1) break up the NFL- It would simply require the NFL to compete in the free market for the services of individual players the same as other Americans compete in the free market. It was this fear of free market competition which drove the owners running like banshees to sign the CBA in the first place. The team owners have been confronted with a choice by the decertification of the NFLPA of making more money or retaining their rights as sole owners of the NFL. As is often the case in our country they went with the money the first two times, but now are trying to re-leverage the deal to both get the money and recover a clear majority share of the revenues. 2) abolish the draft- under US law we generally favor the rights of the individual over the rights of state and certainly by law over a mere corporation. The courts have consistently ruled that the NFL can have a draft (even though this abridges the ability of an individual to sell his services to the highest bidder if he chooses) IF and only IF the individuals in the market in question have legitimately selected an agent to release their individual rights in exchange for an equitable deal. The NFL can have its draft (and do the un-American thing of restricting the individual to sign with only one party) if and only if the individual rights are protected by a bargaining agent, namely the NFLPA in this case. The pathetic thing to me in this case is that a corporation, the NFL is demanding by fiat to force the individual to only sale their services to one buyer (the team that selected them in a draft). This is un-American from my point of view. How on earth can you justify the NFL actually barring adults from signing free market contracts with teams as the NFL proposes to do in the draft without any bargaining agent for the players now that decert has happened. I can easily see the court standing up for the individual against the powers of a corporation. For the courts not to protect the individual would simply be un-American IMHO.

I agree with you that the players did not make a mistake here under almost any circumstances as even if they choose to essentially capitulate to the owners offer, they will get a better offer later in the negotiations than right now. However, my GUESS is that we will not have to wait until August/September for a final offer but actually the draft in April to some extent will be a drop dead date for the owners. The lawsuit in question after decertification is an anti-trust restraint of trade action. One need only ask the question why is the NFLPA existence of such import to the team owners that the decertification tactic has resulted in the late 80s CBA which totally reversed the butt-thumping the owners laid on the NFLPA after the 87 lockout. How did this threat lead to the owners signing onto the current CBA which Upshaw publicly and correctly declared before negotiations would base the salary cap on all gross revenues rather than designated revenues, and also would award the players with a salary cap % which began with a 6. The answer is that the NFL engages in huge restraints of free trade for individuals with the draft, In addition, unlike all other major league sports, the NFL flat out refuses to allow any team to sign not only undergrads, but in fact does not allow individual teams to even sign adults until the year they were born graduates. The only reason the courts even allow such a horrendous violation of the rights of individuals in our capitalistic system is because the agreed upon bargaining agent for the players participates in this anti free trade anti capital assault on individual freedoms. Once the NFL engages in a draft without their co-conspirator the NFLPA it really is case closed on this rampant violation of individual rights. I do not see how the NFL will be able to prevail in any court that it is simply forcing any individual to only sale their wares to one buyer. Its simply un-American.

It might turn out as you suggest with Doty or some other authority compelling the owners to comply with sharing the books with their partners the NFLPA (I think the mistake many make is simply viewing this as a traditional AFL-CIO dispute). Ed Garvey and the NFLPA viewed it this way in the late 80s and got their heads handed to them by the owners in the replacement player move. However, led by the talented tenth of NFL players (90% are drugged up lemmings who have been told when to eat, drink, sleep by coaches all their lives) which was smart enough to hire smart NYC lawyers and understand and sell to their playing colleagues the decertification strategy they forced the owners to make them partners as embodied in the CBA. My sense is that what owners really objected to in the now suspended CBA was that on paper it really reduced them to minority partner status. What it looks like to me is actually that the NFLPA is setting up to get a new league created (which I have dubbed the NEWFL) which will create the thing the NFLPA actually wants which is competition, If good ol American competition were to come up against the NFL the likely result is both higher wages and more members for the NFLPA much as failures like the USFL and the WFL and successes like the AFL had the primary effect of raising player wages.

I think the question that needs to be asked is who is the boss in the NFL. With the lockout of 1987, the team owners clearly cleaned the clock of the NFLPA which led in a traditional ADL-CIO style by Ed Garvey. The replacement player strategy clearly forced the players to come crawling back. However, it so undermined Garvey that what I call the talented tenth of NFL athletes led by Gene Upshaw were able to link up with some smart NYC lawyers and talk the rest of the players into a decertification strategy. This strategy actually forced the owners to run kicking and screaming to negotiate the CBA which really changed the owner/player employer/employee relationship into one of a partnership between owners and players for who was boss of the league. The owners still were the boss as they did things like get rid of general admission seats they had to split with the players and instead made a smaller number of premium seats they did not have to split ticket revenue with the players (for example total capacity at the Ralph dropped 5K but as they replaced regular seats with premium seats Mr. Ralph increased his take even if fewer people could come to the game. The owners clearly were running the store, but in the negotiations which produced the current CBA Upshaw publicly declared that the new CBA would eliminate the designation and the cap would be set from total revenue. He also announced that the new player share MUST begin with a 6. Arguably as the players ended up with a significant majority of the revenue at 60.5% the players became the boss. My GUESS is that this move by the owners will actually further move this process along as the best move for the players would seem to be to in essence get replacement (actually suplumemtary as they do not want to kill the owners but simply bring competition so they can get even more $ and members from establishing a new competing league. I think it is a mistake to simply think of the owners as bosses, really all they are is a capital source which was essential at the beginning of the league but really has multiple replacement sources right now.

No one knows for sure which is what makes this so difficult. It really depends on what happens next. You can pretty much ignore any predictions which claim to be based on what WILL happen because no one knows what WILL happen. Basically no one saw the NFLPA threat to decertify as a likely possibility in 1987. In fact it was an effective tactic by the players exactly because no one expected this unlikely move. The team owners were smug in their victory at that point as they had totally smashed the traditional AFL=CIO tactices of the NFLPA under the leadership of Ed Garvey. What the team owners did not calculate was that they got hoist on their own petard of sponging off colleges and taxpayers to train and develop their young athletes (which is unlike other pro sports such as MLB and the NHL which invest significant money in contracting with minor league teams and pay huge speculative deals to 16 year old talents). The NFL got the immediate advantage that tax payers and others paid their training and development costs, but in the longer term ended up negotiating with adult players to sign deals. Most players are steroid infused athletes who have been coddled and ordered around since high school. However, there also was a talented tenth of MFL athletes led by folks like Gene Upshaw, Troy Vincent, TKO Spikes etc who spent their off-seasons getting Ivy League business degrees. This talented tenth have run the NFLPA and hired smart NYC lawyers who helped them develop and sale to the players )who were ripely disaffected with traditional union models after Garvey got their butt kicked by he owners) the CBA of the late 80s and early 90. This talented tenth cadre led negotiations of the last CBA which brought the players the vast majority of total revenues in the deal. They now are organizing things such that my guess they are moving to actual replace (really supplement actually as they do not want to kill the owners just create competition and more money for them) the NFL owners with what I am calling the NEWFL. To answer the question directly, my GUESS is that what the draft will do is put the nail in the coffin of the current NFL. Since they have lost the NFLPA as a co-conspirator, what the draft will do is stop individuals from selling their services to whatever team bids highest. The Un-American restraint on individuals by assigning them to only one team will founder and the players will be siding with individual rights in court. I am not sure how the NFL even works without a draft so overall I think that draft strategy is going to not correspond to reality. We will see.

Actually, I think that is where the NFLPA is headed though it will take it a year or two to get there. My GUESS is this. I. The NFLPA Goal- Get more members and get these members the maximum amount of compensation for their work. II. The NFLPA Strategy A. Emphasize solidarity by the players by showing strong leadership which pushes the theme we all stand together as players or we will fall apart. B. Support the NFL players staying together by: 1. Promoting a framework for the last two years centering around the player reps elected by each team. The player rep emphasizes initially to each team member that the owners have chosen to re-open the deal and there is nothing they can do about except respond as best they can. 2. Emphasize to individual players the last two years that the intelligent thing for them to do is set aside some salary so they can live for up to six months in a restricted style from full bore NFL partying and bling which most players adopt. 3. Set aside a strike fund which cm be utilized by those players who through no specific and actions on their part run into financial trouble. These funds will be decided upon by a council of player reps (the reps were elected by their members and thus already have the agreement of the body politic in question- the players-) a. There will need to be an emphasis on transparency in order to make this work and be trustworthy for the players and enhance solidarity. The players council which makes the decisions will be empowered to use it to support players who get in financial trouble not through excessive partying and lots of bling but through other means like normal business setbacks. b. for example, if a player has taken reasonable steps to set aside money as the NFLPA advised )the NFLPA should have advised players to adopt a strategy 2 years ago called dollar cost averaging where they place a set amount each month from their salary for investing. This amount actually need not be outrageous just simply stable. If an NFL player had set aside a relatively mere $3,000 a month for investment in stocks 2 years ago, today this fund would be worth not only the $72,000 in principal but actually as the market has performed quite well the last two years my sense is their principal would be approaching $100K. The question would be can they hold out for 6 months or more on $100K. The answer is no if they want bling but the answer is yes with the support and solidarity of fellow union members and the lockout fund for players in legit trouble. c. Legit trouble will be defined as business setbacks. For example if a player stored their money in real estate purchases the last two years but in real life real estate markets have gone down the last two years. In addition real estate generally as an investment is simply not liquid and is hard to turn into cash easily or profitably a player who did this may be in legit trouble. d. The strike fund can then be authorized by a subcommittee of player reps to simply write checks to players who admit they are in financial need through legit business downturns. They can simply get checks written to them if they 1). Take the money as a loan to be paid back by the player or a longer period of time at an inflation rather than usury rate charged by loansharks or some private lenders like banks 2). The player can simply get checks written from the strike fund only if they are willing to participate in economic education from their union peers. 3). The psychology of money management and honesty in our society is difficult at best. However, by both offering help to players who suffered honest fiscal setbacks and also raising the negatives of blinging and overspending in these times of union battling, they can actual both enhance solidarity and depopularize outrageous behavior. They will accuse attempted lockout crossers as stabbing fellow union members in the back and only advocating this because they mismanaged their holdings in the first place living beyond NFLPA recommended means and not availing themselves of strike fund support and financial counseling. 4. A careful balance will need to be struck, but a useful example can be set by really going after one bad example some player sets of living too glamorous a life or showing off too much bling during this fiscal fight. Solidarity needs to be emphasized in that this idiot should not be killed, but NFLPA leaders will need to emphasize that too much bling behavior during this fight is not looked upon kindly by union brothers. IF the NFLPA uses an infrastructure voted on by the members, emphasizes to the player reps the last two years they need to talk a lot to members and show transparency (not so much in naming specific names but in sharing total expenditure lumped information), they have a strike fund system based on a revolving loan fund to help players in legit financial trouble, they use a single case of a player living beyond their means or showing too much bling as a negative assault on brother union members they can with hard work and good leadership hold out for six months or maybe more. 5. Invest in a strategy of showing solidarity and leadership among the most high profile player for the NFLPA cause. The Brady. et al lawsuit which is joined by others such as Peyton Manning and Drew Brees is an impressive example that this approach is in play and being used well by the NFLPA. 6. Develop an ongoing source of cash for individual players and to support the strike fund over time. If the NFLPA can sell to some network a competition between NFL players that gets them some immediate cash for performing and supports the strike fund, this can be a substantial benefit. These "games" would need to benefit not only the high profile players who must participate to make this saleable but also allow some of the average skill players to be a part of this and get cash. My guess is a flag football set of 7 on 7 games and pseudo ongoing league might do the trick nicely which will be put up at some point in mid to late summer. III. The NFLPA Objective The measurable objective will be to set-up an alternative league which over 6 months to a year can be transitioned into a parallel structure to the NFL. The NEWFL will be designed to foster that great American thing known as competition. Ultimately players will try to set up a bidding war for individual player services much the way the AFL bid up the salaries for NFL players starting with their big contract for Namath. If a few high profile player like a Manning, Brees, etc go over to the NEWFL, a good chunk of moderate ST type players like an Izzo or a Corto go over not at an outlandish salary but a raise, competition will be benefit the NFLPA. The goal and objectives will not be to kill the current NFL team owners but actually keep them around and raise individual player salaries by forcing them to compete. IV. The Replacement Owners I see several potential sources for replacement (actually supplementary from the NFLPA standpoint because they do not want to kill the current owners just force them to compete and pay players salaries) A. Big money individuals who do not yet own NFL teams 1. As we saw with Pegula one of the richest men in the country who just bought the Sabres there are individuals with big $ out there who might want to buy a team, Even Tom Golisano who just sold the Sabres is sitting there with big money (form his own wealth and Pagula) which will need to be plowed back into some economic use or merely become a capital game not offset with a capital expenditure by buying a new team. The dot.com boom is clearly stilted but it is not totally over as folks like Meg Whitman and her E-bay fortune still have the wealth to do things like buy a new college at her alma mater Princeton for several hundred million and simply blow 100 million plus on her failed run for Senate (Linda MacMahon is another example of 10s of millions sitting out there but quite frankly though she, Carl Palladino and Rush Limbaugh are amongst those who likely are easier touches for the millions necessary I would stay away from these idiots who are legends in their own minds). B. Corporations- The deal is that tons of corporations are simply sitting on billions of dollars in cash which they have refused to spend on investments which create jobs. This is shown in an unemployment rate around 9% that has touched 10% when even during bad times experts thought it would not go above 8%. There is a lot of $ out there even in these troubled fiscal times not only in the US but sitting around with individuals and companies in Europe, Hong Kong, and elsewhere who might be useful to provide replacement or supplementary capital for a NEWFL. C. My personal favorite is municipal ownership. I do not mean local tax bodies like cities but models such as the one the GB Packers use of collecting money through individual share sales. The replacement or more accurately supplementary owners would be public bodies hired to manage the team just as Ron Wolf did with the Packers in their second SB winning run. I know if the Buffalo Thrills (or some other name which is attractive to the EXTREME youths of our culture) had high profile players like a Brees to offer and found a way to involve folks like Jimbo (he may not be gettable if the BFL is serious about a bid from him for the Bills but if they are not then his ties to his fellow players and the NFLPA might attract this potential capital raiser- if not him then Thurman or whomever from the vets) offered up shares for as much as $100 bucks a pop I would think hard but probably convince my wife to let me invest. My guess is that even in a small market like Buffalo (I doubt the MEWFL would want to come here as the Bills have the market absorbed, but of Mr. Ralph's heirs want to leave and their is a NEWFL with high profile players like a Manning and some old Bills vet support then sign me up! My sense is that it will be a tough slog no matter which future is created, but I would be reluctant to invest in an NFL with the best of college football and old XFL guys as replacement players. I think it would be a difficult course but ultimately an easier one for Brady, Manning, Brees, et al to find replacement (actually supplementary) owners.

Would you prefer replacement players or replacement owners?