March 12, 2011
Back in January, Roger Goodell made a promise that if a new Collective Bargaining Agreement was not reached by its expiration date, March 3, 2011, he would cut his salary to $1. That deadline was extended by a week in an agreement between the NFL and the Players Association.
That extended deadline was passed yesterday. With a new CBA yet to be reached, the NFLPA declined a final offer by the owners and instead filed for decertification, allowing players to file anti-trust lawsuits now. Without the PA decertifying, players would have to wait to file those lawsuits until six months after the expiration of the CBA.
Today, Roger Goodell made good on his guarantee, cutting his salary to the aforesaid amount. He was scheduled to make $10M this year. League general counsel Jeff Pash also has had his salary cut to $1; he was schedule to earn around $5M this year. In addition to taking the pay cut, Goodell has ordered that all bonus payments to him be delayed until a deal has been reached between the NFL and the Players Association.
Goodell and Pash are not the only league personnel taking pay cuts. Workers with NFL Films, NFLNetwork, and NFL.com are all taking 12% pay cuts. If the work stoppage continues into what would be the NFL Preseason, any management-level employees will also be subject to pay cuts, ranging from 5% for managers to 25% for Executive VP’s.
A few teams, including the Kansas City Chiefs and the New York Jets are making pay cuts for team personnel during the work stoppage. Kansas City is reducing personnel salaries by a little under 10% while allowing all employees keep their jobs. Jets employees are taking a hit of one week’s pay each month during the work stoppage. Employees for both teams will be compensated their lost salaries if the entire 2011 season is played.
In other news, some are calling the NFLPA decertification a sham. If it is, they are in some serious trouble, because they did not wait until the CBA had actually expired.
*If the Stipulation and Settlement Agreement is not the same thing as the CBA, could someone share with me some information on what the SSA is?
More information on the decertification ‘sham’ can be found at the following link:
NFLPA Decertification 'Sham'
