New Union Chief Tutors Players on NFL Economics; $8 Billion on the Line
The new union leader?s quiz of some of the best-educated professional athletes in the country proceeds like this:
?How many people here know the National Football League is a non-profit?? DeMaurice Smith, the longtime Washington, D.C., lawyer asks 75 members of the Seattle Seahawks. No hands rise.
?How many people here know that the NFL has a special antitrust exemption granted to them by Congress?? Again, no hands. ?We all understand the difference between a strike and a lockout?? Silence and blank stares.
Mr. Smith, elected in March to replace the late Gene Upshaw and lead the NFL Players Association, then asks how many players saw the news about the league?s new deal with DirecTV, which guarantees teams an additional $4 billion through 2014. They didn?t. He asks how many of the league?s new and renovated stadiums were paid for with tax dollars. They shake their heads in disbelief when he gives them the answer?virtually all of them.
These men, like many National Football League players, are essentially in the dark on the basic underpinnings of their league?s $8-billion juggernaut, even in an era when teenage phenoms speak of themselves as brands and approach their careers as sophisticated businessmen.
That?s about to change. After two months of visits with nearly every NFL team, Mr. Smith met Tuesday with the league?s player representatives to plot strategy for the upcoming negotiations in what may become the NFL?s most intense labor standoff in two decades. Team owners last year set the stage for this showdown when they voted to terminate the current collective-bargaining agreement after the 2010 season, two years ahead of schedule. Owners say the players? share of the pie?about 60% of total revenues?is too large and needs to be scaled back.
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Football Players Get Tutored on NFL Economics - WSJ.com