*OFFICIAL* 2011 NFL LOCK OUT THREAD

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Bisciotti: Many NFL teams struggling financially, lockout possible

Associated Press

OWINGS MILLS, Md. – Baltimore Ravens owner Steve Bisciotti said Wednesday that several NFL owners are facing a financial shortfall that could create “long-term problems for the league” and ultimately result in a lockout.
As the Ravens prepare for a 2010 season without a salary cap, Bisciotti hinted that the NFL could shut down in March 2011 if the players union doesn’t make concessions in negotiations for a new collective bargaining agreement.
Rob Carr / Associated PressRavens owner Scott Bisciotti said Wednesday that the league signed “a bad deal” with the players in 2006.
Speaking at a news conference in which Ravens officials looked back at last season and ahead to 2010, Bisciotti insisted that many of the 32 NFL teams are struggling to finish in the black.
“I’ve got partners out there right now whose teams are making less money than their linebackers,” Bisciotti said. " I think we’ve got an acute problem here with the general profitability of the teams. We always knew this was not a big cash-flow business, but when you’ve got guys like Jacksonville tarping up 10,000 seats to stop blackouts, when you’ve got teams that are voluntarily staying at the minimum of what they have to spend on the salary cap in order to not go upside down financially, then we already have a structural problem."
Four years ago, the league and players union signed a CBA that Bisciotti labeled “a bad deal” for the owners.
“That puts us in the unenviable position of this thing ending in a lockout as opposed to a strike,” he said. “There’s no cash flow. If we don’t get this thing back to the point that teams have enough cash flow … then there’s long-term problem for the league. We’re going to have to address that.”
Ravens president Dick Cass said the club is “doing well compared to other teams around the league. But just because we’re still doing well in revenues, that doesn’t mean we’re generating a lot of profit.”
Although there’s a good chance there will not be a salary cap in place in 2010, that doesn’t mean a team will be allowed to spend at will. And even by spending the maximum, that won’t guarantee a spot in the playoffs.
Using baseball’s New York Yankees as an example, Bisciotti wondered aloud about the payoff on an unbridled spending spree.
“It certainly doesn’t show up in the standings,” he said. “If I’m a Yankees fan, I’m upset we’re not winning 130 games with the roster that they have and the money that they pay out. I think it’s a disgrace they only beat the average team by 10 games in the standings with three times the money. I’d fire that GM. You don’t need a GM. All you have to do is buy the last Cy Young Award winner every year.”
Bisciotti, 49, has been the Ravens’ owner for 10 years, during which the team has regularly sold out its home games. Despite that, he still has concern about the league’s future.

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“We want to be at a point where teams are not selling off their star players in their fourth year because they can’t afford to sign them to that second contract,” Bisciotti said.
As the Ravens enter an offseason with an uncertain financial environment and no salary cap, general manager Ozzie Newsome is eager to work within the system to enhance their wide receivers and fortify their pass rush.
“The restrictions put on the Baltimore Ravens are put on 31 other ballclubs, too,” Newsome said. “We’ve got to be better than the other 31 clubs in order to make our football team under these circumstances. I look at it as a challenge. It puts the pressure on us to dig down deep to improve our football team.”
The Ravens went 9-7 this season and reached the second round of the playoffs before being eliminated by the Indianapolis Colts, who will play in this Sunday’s Super Bowl. Bisciotti said the improvement of second-year quarterback Joe Flacco will be the key to Baltimore’s success in 2011.
Flacco’s ability to excel could be helped by new quarterbacks coach Jim Zorn – and the addition of a few new targets.
“Do we want to improve at the wide receiver position? Yes, because that will further enhance our running game,” Newsome said. “Having a playmaker on the outside will make Joe Flacco become a better quarterback.”
Copyright 2010 by The Associated Press.

I think that this will happen. It will hurt not having football for a year. Cast your vote, post new info when you have it.

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heard something about this on the drive home today… hrmm

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Hockey players are the least greedy/paid out of any professional sport and it happened to them. It’s probable.

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Teams overspending, and not generating revenue. Yea it’s definatly the players unions fault. I thought the collective bargaining agreement was good til 2012 or something?

The jags had to cover seats because they fucking sucked, whos fault is that? Owners always blame the players union and the league

edit: And lets see if the yankees say anything back… lol

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NFL players union leader says lockout likely in 2011
By RANDY COVITZ
The Kansas City Star

Charles Dharapak
Roger Goodell (left) said the league does not want a lockout, but DeMaurice Smith indicated the NFL is preparing for one in 2011.
More News
NFL players union leader says lockout likely in 2011 Right path leads Saints coach to title game New rules may curtail Chiefs’ free-agency shopping How the Colts’ Freeney is trying to speed the healing of his injury NFL Hall of Famer Dudley dies Dunleavy quits job as Clippers coach, keeps GM job Speed skater Davis shuns the U.S. spotlight Olympics buzz | Hockey team selects two replacements Backstrom, Ovechkin help Caps win 12th straight Purdue edges Indiana 78-75 Super Bowl buzz | Freeney ‘making progress’ UMKC snaps losing streak with 58-56 win over North Dakota State Brown helps Boston College upend No. 6 Duke College buzz | St. Louis running back Pierson commits to Missouri Dustin Johnson takes lead at Riviera Tigers invest $80 million in ace Justin Verlander Gill introduces first KU recruiting class The day after: Of Xavier’s bricks and MU’s (lack of ) boards No. 1 KU barely escapes big upset at Colorado Texas A&M ends Missouri’s 32-game home winning streak The Manning Wall deserves more credit Recruits commit nothing Inspiring autistic football player wins a scholarship Colts’ Lilja still pinching himself Super Bowl buzz: Colts’ Freeney day-to-day WHB snags all non-game Chiefs programming Watson takes a stern tone with Woods South Florida shocks Georgetown 72-64 Unbeaten Nebraska women rout Oklahoma State Saints’ Chase Daniel believes he belongs in the NFL Missouri has a corner on defensive backs Hearts swell on signing day K-State’s recruiting class is an interesting mix Jayhawks make wide receiver a priority Thunder, Durant shoot down Hornets Blue Jackets fire coach Ken Hitchcock Olympics Buzz: Jamaica not on bobsled list The Buzz: Mickelson won’t use wedge Photos | Signing day for high school athletes No. 10 Kansas State cruises to 76-57 win over Nebraska FORT LAUDERDALE, Fla. | DeMaurice Smith, executive director of the National Football League Players Association, gave dire odds Thursday on the chances the NFL owners will lock out the players in 2011.

“On a scale of 1 to 10,” Smith said, with 10 being the likelihood of a lockout, “it’s a 14.”

The collective-bargaining agreement between the players’ association and the owners expires in March 2011. The owners opted out of the current agreement two years early, and as part of that action, the league will play the 2010 season without a salary cap.

The owners, citing increased costs, particularly in the construction and maintenance of new stadiums, want to reduce the players’ 60 percent of total revenue they currently receive. But the union is steadfast against it, claiming the league, awash in money, is asking the players to take an 18-percent pay cut.

Smith, during the NFLPA’s annual Super Bowl news conference, pointed to two indicators that the league is preparing for a lockout: The league hired as its lead negotiator Bob Batterman, the attorney who represented the NHL during its lockout in 2007; and the league negotiated network television deals that guarantee the NFL $5 billion a year even if games are not played.

Smith, who replaced the late Gene Upshaw as NFLPA executive director, said NFL team values have increased almost 500 percent in the last 15 years, the league generated $8 billion in revenues last season, and the clubs, according to Forbes magazine, earned average profits of $31 million in 2008. But the league is proposing a pay cut “that would put us back to 1992 or 1993” salaries.

“When you look at every step that has occurred, is it more of a preparation to play football, or more of a preparation to not play football,” Smith said. “On the day where someone can sit down with us as players and partners, and say to us, ‘Our profit margin has decreased to X.’ Well, that’s how you get a deal done.”

The league has not opened its teams’ books to the union, and the only team whose financials are known are the publicly owned Green Bay Packers. Smith said in 2008, a season in which Brett Favre had left the club, and the team had a losing record, the Packers still showed a $20 million profit.

“Does that sound like a business model where the people who play this game, who risk everything without a guaranteed contract should give up 18 percent?” Smith said.

Smith also said before the players receive 60 percent of total revenue, $1 billion is taken off the top and goes directly to management and is used for stadium renovations, stadium upkeep and goes toward the G-3 program that helps finance new stadiums. That essentially drops the players’ share to 52 percent of all revenues.

“On top of that $1 billion taken off the top,” Smith said, “they want to (take) another $1 billion.”

NFL commissioner Roger Goodell will give his views on the labor situation today during his annual State of the League news conference. However, he said in an interview with Sirius Radio that the league does not want a lockout.

“You don’t make money by shutting down your business,” Goodell said. “So the idea that the owners want to lock out and not play football is absolutely not the case. But when you’re going into these negotiations, both sides are going to be prepared for all the alternatives.

“Since this agreement was reached in 2006, the NFL generated additional, incremental dollars of $3.6 billion, and $2.6 billion of that went to the players. So that leaves $1 billion for the owners and their costs of operations. Unfortunately those costs exceeded that billion and, actually, the owners are $200 million worse off. That’s a demonstration that the model is not working and it’s got to get fixed. That’s where the owners are.”

NFLPA president Kevin Mawae of the New York Jets said the union is encouraging the players to save 25 percent of their salaries and prepare for a lockout. Union dues were increased starting in 2009, and that money will be rebated in the event of a lockout.

Smith, surrounded by 12 former players, including Hall of Fame running back Barry Sanders, said the union also will propose that each team takes 2 percent of its annual profits and give it to a fund for retired players.

Posted on Thu, Feb. 04, 2010 11:07 PM

Read more: NFL players union leader says lockout likely in 2011 - KansasCity.com

Union dues, wow, just wow. UAW’ish…

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The Jaguars didn’t suck, they were almost a playoff team. They were much better than the Bills.

This is definitely happening. The players currently get 59% of revenues. The owners want to make it 41%. No way that big of a bridge gets settled without one. I’m OK with it because my Chargers stand to benefit the most of pretty much any team from the uncapped season, due to its limits on free agency, but they’ll probably choke in the playoffs again anyway.

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Yeah its gonna blow missing football.

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Out of that second article posted… it seems the owners are being greedy. they want to continue their same tactics, but just want more money to do so. An 18% paycut is a lot of money. Maybe they should just cut spending :gotme:

And it says the players technically get 52%…
The players are what make the leagues, not the owners. The owners try to always get hollywood with their shit.

It really seems similar to the time warner situation, and the problems they always have with networks

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most owners have alot more overhead than the players do. Imagine what a monthly payment for those financed stadiums run.

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can you imagine what Jones is paying out in Dallas. hes bank’d tho and it helps that its universal.

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The owners already get the gravy trains from their localities. How many businesses get the taxpayers to build them a venue to charge them a shitload for tickets in it and keep the profits?

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average NFL players salary according to NFLPA --> $1,100,000.00

average salary in USA according to SSA data for 2008–> $39,652.61

even with an 18% pay cut it would take the average worker 23 years to make what the average NFL player makes in a year.

I don’t care one way or the other what happens because I’m not a fan of the NFL. But its kind of hard to take the NHLPA’s sob story seriously when the players they represent populate the top 2% of this countries wage earners.

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Their argument is that the average NFL career is 4 years.

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even at 4 years it would take the average worker 92 years to make the average NFL wage after the 18% pay cut…way more than most people will make in a lifetime.

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Where’s the option for Both sides are greedy bastards?

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Im sick of the boohoo i make 40k a year and T.O makes 7mill a year argument. Shut up