Posted by Sabrina B. @gametimegirl
The NFL and the NFL Players Association have mutually agreed to a seven-day extension of their talks toward a new collective bargaining agreement, and the two sides will resume labor negotiations on Monday under the continued supervision of federal mediator George Cohen, sources said Friday.
An announcement is expected shortly. The new CBA expiration date is next Friday, sources tell ESPN NFL Insider Adam Schefter.
Under the terms of a “tolling agreement,” the league’s 32 teams still will be prohibited from conducting or executing player transactions. It is the same agreement that was reached via a 24-hour extension of talks Thursday.
The CBA was set to expire at midnight Thursday, which would likely have prompted the first work stoppage since 1987 for a league that rakes in $9 billion a year.
Friday morning, NFL commissioner Roger Goodell and several league executives met with Cohen. NFLPA executive director DeMaurice Smith and Kansas City Chiefs guard Brian Waters showed up about two hours later, then Smith left the building at about 1 p.m. after a two-hour stay.
Smith refused to answer questions.
“We want to continue to thank our fans for still being patient as we work through this,” he said.
Before heading in to meet with Cohen on Friday, NFL lead negotiator Jeff Pash said, “If we can make the kind of progress that you needed to make to have a further extension, that’s where we’d be looking.”
The 24-hour extension agreed to Thursday, according to sources, had given the union a chance to review the league’s latest proposal and for both sides to decide on the next step — an extension, more negotiations, a lockout or decertification. And they went the route of another extension.
In addition to the owners’ proposal Thursday, the union has also made concessions in the latest negotiations, sources on both sides said. The details of those concessions are unknown.
Allowing the CBA to expire could put the two sides on the road to a year without football, even though opening kickoff of the 2011 season is still six months away. The labor unrest comes as the NFL is at the height of its popularity, breaking records for TV ratings: This year’s Super Bowl was the most-watched program in U.S. history. The previous No. 1 was the 2010 Super Bowl.
Earlier Friday, sources sources familiar with the process told Schefter that the sides narrowed the financial gap between them by roughly $5 million per team per year. Nevertheless, a significant divide exists — roughly $25 million per team per year. With 32 teams in the league, the gap equates to $750 million to $800 million per year.
Chris Mortensen is a senior NFL analyst for ESPN. Information from The Associated Press was used in this report.
