Rex Ryan can expect his pay check next week to be a little lighter.
As expected, the Jets embarked Saturday on organization-wide pay cuts and mandatory furloughs with the lockout underway.
“Our plans are in effect,” the team said in a statement to Manish Mehta of the New York Daily News. “This is a fluid situation. We will obviously be evaluating our approach as events unfold.”
Everyone contracted on the football operations side of the business will take a 25% pay cut. Everyone else will have mandatory furloughs throughout the offseason. If no preseason games are missed, the employees will be reimbursed for the money.
The news is a reminder that the people that can least afford a pay cut will be the ones who get hurt the most in a work stoppage if it drags on. Pay cuts and firings within the league would increase dramatically if a work stoppage stretched into the regular season.
Jets owner Woody Johnson released a statement on the lockout, but it doesn’t really say anything new. It can be viewed here.