I don't understand this "lockout" talk

Yeah, you're wrong about the players "Getting screwed so badly." Every single one of them went into their careers knowing full well the risks they were taking to their personal health, but THEY CHOSE to do it anyway. They make a PERSONAL CHOICE to risk their bodies by playing football. This is simply not the same as you involuntarily breaking your hand at work. These guys go into the game knowing full well that they could injure themselves, possibly even permanently, on any given play.

Sorry, but while I don't wish injury upon anyone, I don't lose sleep over injuries either. It's what the guys signed up for when they decided to make football their career rather than a hobby.

I said the same thing earlier in this thread. One thing I didn't note is that almost all of these guys have college degrees. If they didn't choose to play football they could have chosen the career of their degree. I don't buy the "short life span" "short career bs either."

You know, I was talking to some folks at the Football Pros site about the "Short career of an NFL Player" thing, and we came to the conclusion that it's a bullshit stat used to try and foster support for the players.

The reason why it looks like the average career of an NFL player is so short is because you have a significantly large number of people at the bottom end of the roster who only last a year, maybe two tops. These are people who don't see the field but for maybe a couple plays a game a couple times a year. This greatly skews the "Average lifespan" stat downward.

Damn, SpartaChris is snappin off in this thread, lol.
I have to say, I was misinformed...
I work in a wood shop and make less than 30K and there's no health insurance...Should somebody cry for me too? Ah, NO! Im here on my own free will. I make little cash, but I spend little cash, I make it work. Im pretty happy with my life. I use my ******* head when I make decisions...****, I wish I had their millions of problems ($)...Give me a ******* break! Baseball struck(? word) in 94 or so, and I was just a kid (11). I still harbor a ****** taste in my mouth from that. I hope for the sake of the league they get their little petty differences figured out before they all of a sudden have NO job, NO income. Ah, I'd love to see the diva's, for 1 month, make it work on 50k annual income.
Cry me a river.........

It's not so much about snapping off as I hate when people play the "Woe is me" card.

The practice squad guys make $5200 a week, minimum. That's $83,200/year to sit on the friggin practice squad. Obviously it's not that simple as players are cut all the time depending on team needs, but still, it's great work if you can get it.

The minimum NFL salary this year is what, $350,000 just to be on the active roster? That's approximately 7 times more than the national median household income. While I certainly don't have a problem with players earning that kind of money for essentially being a glorified practice squadder, it's hard for me to be too sympathetic towards the players. You want health insurance? Pay for it. God knows you make more than enough money, should you choose to budget properly.

NFL, NFLPA agree to extend the deadline for filing collusion case | ProFootballTalk

Forward progress.

I want to address the concerns about the "woe is me" card that SpartaChris brought up. Just wanted to be sure you all understood the players don't want more $$ from the new CBA. It was the owners who opted out of the previous CBA and they are the ones keeping the players off the field next year.

To get a good read on the players' side, you all should read this ESPN special commentary (sports.espn.go.com/espn/commentary/news/story?id=5995362) by the NFLPA's George Atallah if you haven't already. Good luck against the Eagles this weekend!

Right, the owners exercised THEIR RIGHT to opt out early, as was agreed upon in the last CBA. Stop trying to make it more than it is.

I want football in 2011. Go Pack

Until the teams and the NFL pay for their own stadiums I'm not going to pick a side. Both are greedy.

+1000

Millionaires vs Billionaires, both expecting the fans to pay for whatever they come up with. The money is ruining the Game, as you would expect from the root of all evil.

MONEY itself is NOT the root of all evil. The LOVE of money is.

Money is simply an object, and having it doesn't make you any more evil than having a coffee table. However, it is the things you might do to obtain it that could make you evil.

"MONEY itself is NOT the root of all evil. The LOVE of money is."

Good point, though many in today's society sees greed as a virtue, and charity as a deadly sin. Very sad.

Well, think about it for a minute- If it weren't for greed, at least in some part, most modern day advancements would never have been realized, at least not yet. There would be no lap tops, smart phones, hybrid cars or Google. There would also be fewer jobs paying enough for people to live on. There would be no pay raises, no investments, no advancements in medicine. So greed can in fact be good. Everything in moderation though.

Where greed isn't good is in cases like Bernie Madhoff, where the greed is designed to only benefit one person and has no benefit to anyone else.

And while being charitable is noble, and more people should do it, FORCED charity is patently unfair, and un-American in a lot of ways. Thomas Jefferson said it best:

It could be argued that if it weren't for greed, Capitalism wouldn't work.

Regardless of your stance on the lockout, I wanted to direct your attention to Let Us Play day tomorrow (Tuesday). There will be a ton of current/former players and other NFLPA execs leading twitter chats/ustream chats/etc tomorrow to help educate fans about the lockout. If you have any questions for them or want to stay up to date with the goings on of the whole situation, I suggest you follow along on twitter (@NFLLockout, @NFLPA) and on Facebook (facebook.com/NFLLockout)

Be sure to RSVP to the FB event and check out the info section for more details from NFLPA President Kevin Mawae.

How long does Kevin Mawae plan on serving now that he is retired?

I hate to say it, but as much as I love football, I just still don't see the players side of this debate. Signing that petition is essentially taking a side just to get to an endpoint, without really caring much about the issue at hand. I just don't see the justification in players asking for money, when teams with open books are clearly losing profits.

@Kitten thanks for posting the petition. Hope you guys have taken the time to check it out, or at least check out some of the news posted at that site. It's a good resource if you hope to stay up to date on the labor discussions.

@Incubes the players are not asking for more money. They are in fact perfectly fine with playing under the current agreement. This is not a strike, it's a lockout. The owners are locking the players out of their jobs. So the petition is designed to show the owners how much the players and fans hate the idea of a lockout and want to see NFL football in 2011.

@Incubes It is infact the other way around, the team owners are asking for more money from the TV contracts. They want the first 2 billion dollars from about 9 or so that they earned last year. The 9 billion gets divided right now between the owners and the players! It is about 60% players and 40% owners right now. The owners want more and the players are asking the owners to open their books. NBA went through the same thing and showed that most of the teams are loosing money but for some reason NFL owners don't want to do it (my guess is that they are not loosing money that's why).

Oh please, stop trying to spin this for more than it really is. What the owners want is a more than deserved give back from the players. The NFLPA already admitted the owners got a raw deal last time, so the owners want something a bit more equitable, especially when owners are responsible for paying for things like stadium expansions, business creation and development.

As I understand it, the owners currently get $1B "off the top" and they want $2B. Now I'm not an arbitrator but how 'bout if they settle for about $1.5B?

BTW, something about the current deal I’ve never understood is why do draftees, particularly at the top of the draft, get such huge contracts? That’s not in the interest of the majority of the members of the NFLPA or the owners, of course. As part of the new CBA why not reduce rookie contracts and increase minimum salaries of vets and the benefits of retired players? In return have rookies sign for just 3-4 years so those deserving can really “cash in” then.

The players have actually proposed a proven performance plan like you suggested. It would reward the proven vets and save $$ for the owners. Unfortunately the owners turned down the deal, seeking more cash from the players. This Yahoo Sports article titled "The Real Story Behind the Rookie Wage Scale" explains it all pretty well. What do you guys think about that proposed plan?

Two Questions
1. Where does the Packers organization fit into this since they do not have a sole owner?
2. Would there even be talks of a lockout if each and every NFL team was community owned such as the Packers?