In what has been considered one of the worst case scenarios during this entire ordeal, the NFLPA is officially no more.
After 16 days of federally mediated negotiations, including one last ditch effort this afternoon, the NFL Players Association has filed the papers to decertify — in effect, breaking up the players’ union. This comes just two days after both parties reportedly agreed to a rookie wage scale, fueling speculation that the sides were moving in the right direction.
“The NFLPA will move forward as a professional trade association with the mission of supporting the interests and rights of current and former professional football players,” the group said Friday in a statement.
As ESPN’s Chris Mortensen reports in the video above, the union gave the NFL one last chance to open up their financial books, but the owners wouldn’t budge and no further extension could be reached. The players rejected one last proposal and, as union boss DeMaurice Smith put it, “significant differences continue to remain.”
“We met with the owners until about 4 o’clock today,” union head DeMaurice Smith said outside the mediator’s office. “We discussed a proposal they had presented. At this time, significant differences continue to remain. We informed the owners that … if there was going to be a request for an extension, that we asked for 10 years of audited financial information to accompany that extension.”
After the decertification process took place, the players union, as expected, filed a class-action, anti-trust lawsuit against the league. Ten prominent players, including Peyton Manning, Tom Brady, and Drew Brees were among those to attach their names to the U.S. District Court suit.
According to the NFL, the union “left a very good deal on the table.” In a statement released by the league, the offer included:
• Maintaining the 16 regular-season games and four preseason games for at least two years, with any changes negotiable.
• Instituting a rookie wage scale through which money saved would be paid to veterans and retired players.
• Creating new year-round health and safety rules.
• Establishing a fund for retired players, with $82 million contributed by the owners over the next two years.
• Financial disclosure of audited league and club profitability information that is not even shared with the NFL clubs. That was proposed by the NFL this week, and rejected by the union, which began insisting in May 2009 for a complete look at the books of all 32 clubs.
It is undecided if the NFL will choose to lock out its players, who also filed an injunction to stop that process from happening. Although there’s a good chance there will be football this year, no one knows if (or when) an agreement will take place, meaning the sport could have its first work stoppage since 1987.
