New York Giants CEO John Mara wrote an essay regarding the stalemate between the NFL and NFLPA on Thursday, calling for an immediate return to negotiations.
Mara spent time discussing the impending disaster that would befall the NFL if the players win their lawsuit, citing among other things the league’s minimum wage scale and the draft.
As he chastised the players for walking away from court appointed mediation, at no time did Mara mention the fact that the owners backed out of the collective bargaining agreement of 2006.
The owners brought this upon themselves when several of the NFL’s big market teams essentially rammed the old CBA down the remaining owners throats.
Dallas Cowboys owner Jerry Jones, Washington Redskins owner Daniel Snyder and New England Patriots owner Bob Kraft were very instrumental in striking the deal that brought about labor peace in 2006.
But those same big market owners, including Mara, began to recognize that the 2006 CBA wasn’t working in their favor, mostly because of revenues they gave up to address the financial issues of the small market teams.
In an effort to address those financial issues, the NFL’s owners opted out of the CBA. But now Mara wants to blame the players for taking the action they did to protect their interests.
Mara says that before he became the Giants CEO he worked as an attorney representing several labor unions. He believes in the collective bargaining process and says that the solution to the league’s current labor dispute is through negotiation.
According to Mara, the best way to achieve that purpose is for the NFL and NFLPA to avail themselves of their labor law rights. Isn’t that exactly what both sides have done throughout this entire process?
The owners opted out of the CBA and eventually locked out the players, who in turn decertified their union and filed suit against the league. Correct me if I’m wrong, but those actions indicate that both sides have done what they felt was best.
Mara attempts to blame an “unbalanced” CBA that needed to be addressed, even going as far to say that the players knew they got a great deal in 2006.
Perhaps Mara is suggesting that these supposedly well-educated, successful business men who own the 32 NFL franchises were unaware of how unbalanced the CBA was when they agreed to the terms.
But we all know that isn’t the case.
Those same big market owners who pushed the 2006 CBA onto the rest of the league are the same people who spoke the loudest about opting out of the deal.
Mara wants us to believe that the onus for reaching labor peace rests solely with the players returning to mediation, but he, along with the other big market franchises, are the most responsible despite the fact he doesn’t want to acknowledge it.
In his effort to persuade NFL fans into believing the owners are doing everything in their power to arrive at a new CBA, Mara comes off sounding like a man who’s completely unaware that he helped make this bed, but doesn’t want to sleep in it.
Instead of insulting the intelligence of NFL fans, maybe it would be best for Mara to use an approach devoid of condescension and hypocrisy.
The only way a new CBA is going to be reached is through honest, forthright negotiations between parties that aren’t attempting to curry favor from the fans.
And from what we’ve seen thus far, the owners and players have each tried to do just that.
NFL fans know what the owners and players are trying to do, but it’s too bad that Mara doesn’t seem to know it.
Here’s some free advice for John Mara: instead of taking time to write essays where you attempt to blame the players and use fans as pawns, maybe it would be best if you looked in the mirror and had a serious conversation with the guy staring back at you.
If that conversation goes as it should, you will have an epiphany and rightly discover that the NFL’s labor issues came about because you weren’t smart enough to know the old CBA was unbalanced.
Put all these wankers in a room, lock it up and don’t open it until they slide a contract under the door.