NFL Players Urge Indiana to Vote ‘No’ on RTW
This just in from the Indiana AFL-CIO:
Following the NFL Players Association statement on “right to work” Friday, six NFL players have sent letters to the Indiana state representatives and senators denouncing the so-called “right to work” legislation.
Trai Essex (Steelers), Rex Grossman (Redskins), Mark Clayton (Rams), Jay Cutler (Bears), Courtney Roby (Saints), and Kris Dielman (Chargers), all Indiana natives, urged lawmakers to “vote “NO” on the so-called “right-to-work” bills that are dividing working families at a time when communities need to stand united.”
They also stated that “as Indianapolis proudly prepares to host the Super Bowl, it should be a time to shine in the national spotlight and highlight the hard working families that make Indiana run instead of launching political attacks on their basic rights.”
NFL Players Association Rejoins AFL-CIO
When the 2011 National Football League season kicks off next month, the players on the field will again be members of the AFL-CIO. After negotiating a fair and secrure contract and reconstituting their union, the National Football League Players Association (NFLPA) today rejoined the federation. The NFLPA renounced its status as a union in March so the players could take advantage of legal anti-trust action against the owners’ lockout.
“It was the steadfast unity of our players and support from millions that allowed us to reach a fair deal for the working men who risk their health and safety to play professional football,” said DeMaurice Smith, NFLPA’s executive director.
We have a renewed sense of unity that we’re excited to bring to our reaffiliation with the AFL-CIO. As we all face tough economic times, we see what’s possible when we work together.
NFL Continues Unreasonable Demands on Players
The NFL is continuing to make unreasonable demands on players even after agreeing to a new collective bargaining agreement.
Writing in Phanatic Magazine, Matt Chaney says the players were getting railroaded on testing for recombinant human growth hormone or HGH. and they are refusing to go along any more.
NFL Owners’ Lockout Hits Workers, Players and Communities
In Orchard Park, N.Y., just about 600 yards from the Buffalo Bills’ Ralph Wilson Stadium, where as many as 73,000 football fans gather on fall Sundays, sits the Big Tree Inn. Owner Dan DeMarco tells ESPN.com those Sundays account for 30 percent of his annual revenue.
But with the NFL season in jeopardy because of the owners’ lockout of the players, DeMarco says he and his 12 employees are “just praying.”
Everybody says “there’s only eight or nine home games,” but people don’t realize that a home-game crowd starts showing up on Thursdays and pours into Mondays. People flock in from out of town and fill the motels around here. They give us four or five days of business every home game.
DeMarco is one of 13 “Faces of Lockout” from players on the bubble, to local business owners, team employees and headline players profiled in ESPN.com’s just-posted look at the lockout’s impact.
Earlier this year it was estimated that if the lockout goes into the season, each NFL city stands to lose as much as $160 million and it could cost 150,000 jobs nationwide and have a ripple effect on how other workers across the country are treated, according to people who labor on the field and in the stadiums.
NFL Coaches Team Up with Players to End Lockout
NFL coaches are teaming up with the players in their legal fight to end the owner-imposed lockout. The NFL Coaches Association filed a brief with the 8th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals on Wednesday supporting the players and saying that the lockout is putting their jobs in jeopardy. The owners locked out the players in March after the collective bargaining agreement expired. Players filed suit seeking an end to the lockout and urged owners to return to the table.
No individual coaches were identified in the brief, which said that the eight new coaches hired this year face particularly daunting odds of success if the lockout is not lifted soon. The NFL grants new coaches two extra summer minicamps to get players familiar with the new staff, and the elimination of those camps puts them at a competitive disadvantage heading into the season.
The appeals court has set a June 3 date to hear arguments on whether the lockout is legal. A federal judge in St. Paul, Minn., initially ruled that the lockout was illegal, but the 8th Circuit put a stay on that ruling pending the appeal.
Breaking: Court Rules NFL Can Lock Out Players
This just in. According to CNN:
The Eighth Circuit Court of Appeals granted the National Football League (NFL) request to restore a lockout, according to a court clerk.
The temporary stay of an April 25 lower court order allows NFL owners to again suspend football operations while the NFL Players Association (NFLPA) seeks a new contract.
If the players are locked out when the season starts in September, it would be the first NFL work stoppage since 1987.
A New Yorker article has pointed out what’s behind the owners’ lockout of the players:
It’s about very rich businessmen thinking that they should be even richer.
Read requests from the NFLPA to owners seeking financial information to back the owners’ claims that they are losing money and need to cut players’ pay $1 billion. The owners refused.
Here’s a listing of the owners’ final demands that they characterized as a meet-in-the middle compromise offer. But in fact was little different from their long-standing give-back demands.
Judge Orders NFL Owners to Lift Lockout
In a major win for the NFL Players Association (NFLPA) and a stern rebuke to league owners, U.S. District Judge Susan Richard Nelson told owners to lift the lockout they imposed on players March 12.
NFLPA Executive Director DeMaurice Smith said “I’m happy for our players and for our fans. Those who love football are the winners.” The NFLPA renounced its status as a union in March order to take legal anti-trust action against the owners’ lockout.
In her 89-page ruling Nelson wrote that the players:
have made a strong showing that allowing the league to continue their “lockout” is presently inflicting and will continue to inflict irreparable harm upon them, particularly when weighed against the lack of any real injury that would be imposed on the NFL by issuing the preliminary injunction. The public interest favors the enforcement of the antitrust laws and their underlying pro-competition policy.
New York Giants defensive lineman Osi Umenyiora, one of 12 player plaintiffs in the anti-trust suit against the NFL, said the ruling:
is a win for the players and for the fans that want to see a full NFL season in 2011. The lockout is bad for everyone and players will continue to fight it. We hope that this will bring us one step closer to playing the game we love. Read the rest of this entry »
With $4 Billion in Hand, NFL Owners Stick It to Workers
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The NFL team owners are sitting on a $4 billion war chest. Yet they are attacking not only the players, but their most vulnerable employees as well: concession stand sellers, groundskeepers and office staff.
The Buffalo Bills already have announced pay cuts across the organization, calling it a “program of shared sacrifice.” But the concession workers and game-day workers are doing all the “sharing.” Workers like Billie Feliciano, a mother of two who works at the 49ers stadium in San Francisco and who says a lockout would mean she and her co-workers would not have any money to take care of their families. (See video above.)
Or Keith Strong, a cook at Ford Field, who says:
This is more than a seasonal job. It helps people pay their bills and have a better life. And if they don’t have that, there’s going to be a lot of sad people this season.
Judge Orders NFL Teams to Stop Reducing Workers’ Comp for Ex-Players
In a landmark ruling, U.S. Judge Paul Crotty of the Southern District of New York issued an injunction today requiring all NFL teams and owners to stop seeking to reduce the workers’ compensation benefits due to former NFL players as a result of injuries they suffered while playing the game.
While the NFL Players Association (NFLPA) won an earlier ruling on this issue, teams and owners ignored the decision on workers’ compensation cases around the country. On March 11, the NFLPA renounced its status as a union in order to block a lockout by the owners.
The AFL-CIO, especially through its state organizations, fights to protect and improve workers’ compensation laws to ensure that workers who suffer because of their jobs have adequate medical care and income. Not only are the owners trying to cut workers’ comp, during the lockout, NFL players and their families do not have health care benefits.
Audit Shows NFL Owners Using Misleading Revenue Figures
It turns out that the National Football League has been using misleading and incomplete financial information to convince team owners that NFL players are getting paid too much. Throughout contract talks with the NFL Players Association (NFLPA), the league and the owners kept saying the players received 70 percent of new revenues in salaries.
But now, Howard Fendrich, the Associated Press’ pro football writer, reveals that the players’ actual share was only about 53 percent from 2006 to 2009, according to calculations by the accounting firm that audited the collective bargaining agreement for both sides. Read Fendrich’s article here.
