Nearly four months after their last bargaining session, the NFL and the players’ union will get together on Wednesday to continue to talk about differences on which little or no progress has been made.
Liz Mullen of SportsBusiness Journal reports that the meeting will occur in New York. Recent developments, including the union’s legal attack against the NFL’s television contracts and the active consideration of collusion charges, could make things more tense than usual.
It’s also the first meeting since primary NFL outside labor counsel Bob Batterman declared that the two sides are “as far apart as I could imagine.” During our recent interview of Commissioner Roger Goodell (which will appear in our Season Preview magazine, which you can buy right here), the man who runs the sport would neither agree nor disagree with Batterman’s characterization.
“I don’t characterize it, because there’s no reason to characterize it,” Goodell said. “We have differences that need to get resolved.”
Hopefully, the differences can get resolved. Before that can happen, the two sides need to develop a sense of urgency that, to date, hasn’t existed.