Poison pill?

[Metaphors]

Lot's of petty vindictiveness to the players here. You know the guys we pay to watch and used to root for.

My point is that the legal approach has no logical end. The NFL is run on the wrong side of anti-trust laws so the players are likely to win just about every legal position they take. The problem is that the league that would result after these victories is not what the players want.

The players are using their "union" as a punchline at a time when real unions (protecting vulnerable workers) are under attack. The players are using the legal system as a way to haggle for more money at a time when real victims of persecution don't have the means or voice to get justice.

There is a settlement to be had where the owners get a more comfortable profit margin and the players (current and past) are comfortably taken care of. The players could have kept negotiating and put pressure on the owners to justify how the money difference was worth locking players out and jeopardizing the livelihood of everyone associated with the NFL. They didn't do that. They made it a battle where they threaten to blow up the ship (while they are standing on it) if they don't get the concessions they want. This thread is about how the owners could respond by detonating the ship themselves...but just in areas that particularly hurt the players (though everyone suffers).

The players took a negotiation and turned it into a battle. The owners aren't clean in all of this and they would be the bad guys if they used the lockout to effectively starve the players into concessions. That didn't happen so the players are left as the target of anger from those wanting to see a new CBA.

 

[DW Toys]

My point is that the legal approach has no logical end. The NFL is run on the wrong side of anti-trust laws so the players are likely to win just about every legal position they take. The problem is that the league that would result after these victories is not what the players want.

The players are using their "union" as a punchline at a time when real unions (protecting vulnerable workers) are under attack. The players are using the legal system as a way to haggle for more money at a time when real victims of persecution don't have the means or voice to get justice.

There is a settlement to be had where the owners get a more comfortable profit margin and the players (current and past) are comfortably taken care of. The players could have kept negotiating and put pressure on the owners to justify how the money difference was worth locking players out and jeopardizing the livelihood of everyone associated with the NFL. They didn't do that. They made it a battle where they threaten to blow up the ship (while they are standing on it) if they don't get the concessions they want. This thread is about how the owners could respond by detonating the ship themselves...but just in areas that particularly hurt the players (though everyone suffers).

The players took a negotiation and turned it into a battle. The owners aren't clean in all of this and they would be the bad guys if they used the lockout to effectively starve the players into concessions. That didn't happen so the players are left as the target of anger from those wanting to see a new CBA.

Excellent perspective. You got it right. Both are to blame but the Players I feel and in my opinion wanted to rub the owners face in it. This will come back to haunt them.

The whole point is that people see this "win" as the end of the issue. It is not even the tip of the iceberg. It only reolved the lockout.

The Judges ruling is a two wedged sword as is decertification. Be careful what you wish for. She gave the owners a lot of latitude. The players have no rights, contract share, or union.
DW Toys

 

[Why?PJ]

Exactly. I know you're not really taking sides in this, but I find it truly amazing that some the "fans" that are strongly taking the NFL's side in this are also the ones who are screaming about it being all about liberals vs. conservatives, judges' politics, etc.

In her rulings, Nelson has highlighted the "public interst" (read "fan interest") as being one of the most important factors she's considered in reaching her decisions. How this is concept is lost on some NFL fans is beyond me.

Well, yes, I do--all of them. To think otherwise you would have to be even more cynical than I am, which would be hard to do.

Ironically, it seems like Judge Nelson (who by all rights should be the most dispassionate player in all this) is showing more sympathy to the fans of the game than either the owners or players.

Right on the money JMarr. You might not agree with her ruling, but from everything I have read, her decision is well thought out and written.

While I have to admit that the frustrated fan in me has thought of several of Toys responses to the ruling as good ideas, I take offense to his bullying right wing ideological framing of everyone who disagrees with his narrow point of view as being a "liberal" or an idiot.

As someone firmly in the owners camp (more or less), but often considered liberal in SOME of my political views, that kind of rhetoric is not only divisive, but counterproductive to ever finding common ground. But when you are a "bully" finding common ground is not a viable option or strategy. Name calling and labeling takes precedence, and thus many of Toys' valid points get lost in the needless demagoguery (thank god for spell check on THAT word. )

And with that bit of self righteous pontification, I leave this tread to enjoy the draft for the rest of the day.

Judge Nelsons ruling was moronic, and has zero factual basis in real law. She is not suppose to care about the fans, the players, the owners, or anyone else. her job is suppose to make a ruling based on the law of the land, and nothing more.

Yet her actual ruling is based on her feelings, and nothing more.

And she was dumb enough to say the owners should make up their own rules.

The owners should make up their own rules, giving the players exactly what their imbecilic lawyers supposedly want, which is no rules at all.

No revenue sharing, no draft, no free agency, no anything.

Let the players see the outcome of what would happen if their own lawyers get exactly what they want.

No rules means the players are independent contractors. No rules means no salary cap, no rules on how much anyone gets paid, no rules on competitiveness between each team, etc. Let each team be a single corporation trying to destroy its competitors, watch what that does to the NFL.

Basically this would be a combination of the MLB's worthlessness and how the NFL was in the 60's an earlier.

And if they owners have the guts to do this, they would easily be able to avoid any real antitrust litigation, and the players would quickly fire their entire cabal of morons lawyers and find some people with actual experience in labor disputes, then start negotiating in good faith.

 

[VinnyPatrollie]

Judge Nelsons ruling was moronic, and has zero factual basis in real law. She is not suppose to care about the fans, the players, the owners, or anyone else. her job is suppose to make a ruling based on the law of the land, and nothing more.

Yet her actual ruling is based on her feelings, and nothing more.

And she was dumb enough to say the owners should make up their own rules.

The owners should make up their own rules, giving the players exactly what their imbecilic lawyers supposedly want, which is no rules at all.

No revenue sharing, no draft, no free agency, no anything.

Let the players see the outcome of what would happen if their own lawyers get exactly what they want.

No rules means the players are independent contractors. No rules means no salary cap, no rules on how much anyone gets paid, no rules on competitiveness between each team, etc. Let each team be a single corporation trying to destroy its competitors, watch what that does to the NFL.

Basically this would be a combination of the MLB's worthlessness and how the NFL was in the 60's an earlier.

And if they owners have the guts to do this, they would easily be able to avoid any real antitrust litigation, and the players would quickly fire their entire cabal of morons lawyers and find some people with actual experience in labor disputes, then start negotiating in good faith.

So your suggestion is to screw the pooch, ie: destroy the league. That will show those greedy players.

Yeah. Good idea.

 

[lamafist]

This thread is based on a pretty severe misconception about the result of Judge Nelson's ruling. Leaving it up to the NFL's discretion as to how to recommence operations in no way gives the league carte blanche to operate however they'd like.

If the NFL chooses to instate a protocol that contains antitrust violations that cause irreparable harm to the players, as Nelson ruled the lockout did, the players could have it enjoined just like said lockout -- and the NFL would eventually end up having to pay triple whatever damages the players incurred. The only way the NFL can 'grandfather' in the labor law exemptions from the previous CBA into this year is to use pretty much exactly its terms, or the last best offer from the mediation.

Any serious modification of those terms to the players' detriment would have to be permissible within the scope of labor laws as they apply to the players as individual non-union employees -- which is essentially impossible, as it would require for the NFL's 32 franchises to operate as competing businesses, so any attempt to institute league-wide provisions would be collusion and a willful violation of antitrust law, which, again, the players could bring before Judge Nelson, and have enjoined.