Using personal phone calls, email communication and conference calls, the parties regained some momentum lost on Thursday, and continued driving toward a resolution that could save the four full weeks of preseason games, with the Hall of Fame Game already cancelled. The sides addressed topics such as workers' comp, injury protection in contracts, a potential opt-out clause in the deal and, most pointedly, the potential timeline for the reforming of the NFL Players Association as a union.
Sources on each side said on Saturday night that some issues remain unresolved. But the NFLPA does have its 13-man executive committee and 32 player reps on standby for Monday, with a plan to bring the executive committee to the trade association's Washington headquarters in place, pending continued progress through the weekend. In addition, the NFL's labor committee, which has negotiated with the NFLPA's executive committee throughout, held a Saturday afternoon conference call to discuss the remaining issues.
Two votes have taken place in the last four days, neither of which amounted to a deal. On Wednesday, the NFLPA empowered its executive committee, lawyers and executive director, DeMaurice Smith, to work out a deal, so long as certain conditions were met. On Thursday, the NFL passed a comprehensive proposal 31-0, which rankled scores of players who thought the league had framed it as a deal to put pressure on the other side.
It seems as if cooler heads have prevailed. Goodell and Smith have been in constant contact since the owners and players last met face-to-face, on July 15 in New York, and spoke just before the owners took that vote on Thursday.
And even prior to talks on Saturday, another problem was evaporating.
Earlier in the day, it was learned that the league no longer needed to worry about placating the named plaintiffs in the Brady antitrust lawsuit. Requests for concessions for numerous players -- including but not limited to San Diego Chargers wide receiver Vincent Jackson and New England Patriots guard Logan Mankins -- loomed earlier in the week. But Jackson and Mankins dropped their demands for $10 million to settle the suit against the league, leaving fewer obstacles to a new CBA that would end the four-month-old NFL lockout.
The form in which post-certification issues would be attacked was discussed on Saturday. From a legal standpoint, topics such as benefits (including drug testing) and player discipline cannot be negotiated until after the NFLPA re-forms as a union. The idea, for now, is for the parties to pick up talks on those subjects where they left off in March, when the NFLPA was still a union and negotiations were held at the Federal Mediation and Conciliation Service in Washington.
And that topic -- the actual reformation of the union -- has been a hot one over the past few days as well. The players have concerns over how a hastened recertification process would affect their ability to act legally in any future labor disputes, particularly if the league did choose to assert that a future decertification was a "sham," as it did earlier this year.
According to NFL Network insider Jason La Canfora, an NFLPA source believes that if progress continues, the players could vote on an agreement Tuesday. Owners would have to sign off on the new CBA language, too.
Sources involved in the negotiations also told La Canfora that they believe it's possible the league year will start by Wednesday and training camps could open by Friday. Depending on the timing of a full agreement being reached and a judge signing off on a global settlement, it's also possible that free agency and training camp could open simultaneously, sources said.
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