The unbridled immoderation of Super Bowl week will provide the N.F.L. one last party to send off a fabulously successful season, full of competitive games and robust television ratings. But then, like a bad hangover after Super Bowl Sunday, aching reality will set in. In the last two weeks, personalities as disparate as the Pittsburgh Steelers chairman emeritus Dan Rooney and Jets cornerback Antonio Cromartie aired their concerns about the pace of negotiations on a new collective bargaining agreement, which expires March 3. There has not been a formal negotiating session since Thanksgiving, but there have been dozens of small meetings and quiet talks. Even as union leaders and owners gather in Texas, there are unlikely to be full-scale negotiations.
A look at the issues and where the sides stand: What’s at Stake
The N.F.L. generated nearly $9 billion in revenue last year. While both sides have amassed lockout war chests, millions of dollars will be lost if there is no new deal in March. The N.F.L. expects to lose $120 million in revenue if there is no deal by the deadline and $1 billion if there is no deal by the start of the regular season in September. The league said it would take years to recoup the losses.
The numbers go up from there: $400 million per week if games are missed. Free agents, who cannot sign contracts if there is a lockout, and players who are owed certain bonuses could forgo hundreds of millions of dollars more if no deal is struck in March, the league said.
How Everybody Feels
Both sides are starting to feel the pinch of a potential lockout. Owners are hearing from local sponsors and luxury suite holders that they do not want to renew contracts without an assurance that games will be played — troubling news for small-market teams with narrower margins and owners who have to pay enormous debt service on new or renovated stadiums. Major sponsors are likely to be reluctant to negotiate extensions without knowing what the future looks like.
Players’ concerns are even more immediate. Because in the uncapped year players were eligible for free agency after six years instead of four, a flood of free agents — 495 players by the N.F.L.’s calculation, a quarter of the league’s players — will hit the market, when free agency is expected to go back to four years under a new deal. But players cannot sign deals during a lockout, and few teams are willing to sign even their most prized free agents (Peyton Manning excepted) before March 3 without knowing what rules will be in place under a new collective bargaining agreement.
How Negotiations Have Gone
Slowly. Despite Rooney’s concern about an 18-game regular season, even he knows it is coming. The union leadership has quietly accepted the idea of an 18-game schedule because it knows it is the quickest route to a major infusion of new revenue (mostly from television contracts), a percentage of which will go to players.
DeMaurice Smith, executive director of the N.F.L. Players Association, will have to win significant changes to the off-season schedule and to roster size to make it palatable to the rank and file, which is concerned about the injury impact of a longer season. The league has signaled it is willing to limit off-season workouts and shorten training camp, and possibly to add roster spots, creating more jobs for players. Players also want better postcareer benefits in exchange for an 18-game schedule.
The sides also agree on the need for a rookie wage scale, which will probably start as soon as a new deal is reached. That will free up millions of dollars to be spent on veterans even if the salary cap does not jump drastically and will shore up benefits for retired players. The sticking point: players want an assurance that most of that money will go back to players, not into owners’ pockets.
The major roadblock to a deal, though, remains how to divide the revenue. The N.F.L. currently receives $1 billion off the top of the revenue pool, and the players receive nearly 60 percent of the rest of the money. Owners have wanted to get another $1 billion off the top, arguing that it would help reinvestment in the game, including new facilities and the NFL Network, things that owners say have the potential to generate even more revenue in the future. Players have resisted.
The union wants to preserve at least a 50-50 split of revenue. A question remains: 50 percent of what figure? With more revenue from 18 games, and the shifting of money from rookies to veterans, players may not suffer a loss in real dollars. In fact, players might come out slightly ahead, even in the short term.
Away From the Negotiating Table
The union has initiated several actions intended to increase its leverage. Most immediately, the two sides await a ruling by a special master on a complaint by the union that the owners did not get the maximum value out of recent television contracts because it built in provisions that would pay the owners in the event that games were missed. That ruling could come in the next week or two.
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