NFL commissioner Roger Goodell made clear on Wednesday that a decision for him to start cancelling preseason games because of the lockout is approaching. “We don’t have a date, but obviously that time is coming,” Goodell said as owners wrapped up their spring meetings. The league cancelled its annual rookie symposium this week. It was the first formal casualty of the lockout that began on March 12. The league is mired in a labor impasse, with a hearing at the 8th Circuit Court of Appeals on June 3 set to determine the validity of the lockout. “We’re getting close enough where those will have to be considerations,” Goodell said of considering cancelling preseason games. “Obviously we would
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Roger Goodell: Time coming soon to cancel first NFL game due to lockout
The NFL Spring Meeting is being held in the next season’s Super Bowl city, as usual. The circumstances are anything but. With the clock ticking toward July’s training camps and September’s regular season, NFL general counsel Jeff Pash on Monday echoed the words of New York Jets linebacker Bart Scott, who last week cited the fans’ growing ire toward the lockout. “I really thought he put it very well, that we’re getting to the point where we’re really putting our fans at risk,” Pash said. “We’re getting to the point where people just can’t understand why there’s not a deal being made. And I think in many respects the best thing for all of us to do is get out of court, get out of the media
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Owners talk business at spring meeting as lockout continues
NFL general counsel Jeff Pash was one of the last to file out of a conference room at the downtown Westin following a Monday night meeting with the league’s labor committee. His message to the media was one he has voiced for months, and one he will continue to endorse as long as the labor dispute separates owners and players. Pash insisted the time is right to reach a new collective bargaining agreement and ensure no disruption in the upcoming preseason and regular season. And that resolution will come at the bargaining table, not through ongoing litigation. “I haven’t given up and I’m not going to give up,” Pash said at the onset of the NFL owners’ spring meetings. “Maybe six months from
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Pash: Let’s get back to bargaining table
NFL owners assembled here through Wednesday got their spring meeting going by unanimously approving three rules alterations in the area of player safety. Here are the changes: Rule 12, Section 2, Article 9: Adds some definitions to defenseless player rule, including a receiver “who has not clearly become a runner. If the receiver/runner is capable of avoiding or warding off the impending contact of an opponent, he is no longer a defenseless player.” The change also now incorporates kickers/punters, quarterbacks after a change of possession, and a blindside block “when the player is moving toward his own endline and approaches the opponent from behind of from the side.”
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Owners approve three rules changes
The NFL lockout is now in its 11th week. Yet just 10 weeks from this Sunday, the 2011 season is slated to officially begin when the St. Louis Rams and Chicago Bears kick off the preseason with the Hall of Fame game in Canton, Ohio, on Aug. 7. But how many weeks can pass until the league’s current calendar of events will be seriously jeopardized? The 8th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals ruled last week that the lockout will remain in place until it hears further arguments pertaining to its legality June 3 … though it could be several more weeks before a subsequent ruling is issued. Barring resumption of talks between the league and players toward a new collective bargaining agreement, the
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NFL lockout clock ticking with season opener approaching
The NFL was granted its motion for a stay-on-appeal by the 8th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals on Monday. As such, the league will maintain its right to lock the players out until its appeal of Judge Susan Nelson’s decision to grant a lockout-lifting injunction is ruled on. That case will be heard on June 3 in St. Louis. Rulings in federal cases like this one generally take 30-45 days, though the injunction hearings have been put on an expedited schedule by the 8th Circuit. Meanwhile, the league and players returned to federal mediation, as ordered by Nelson in April, under the auspices of U.S. Magistrate Judge Arthur Boylan on Monday. Michael Hausfeld, lead lawyer for the Eller class in
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Appeals court grants NFL motion for stay, pending appeal
The notion that Donovan McNabb’s career was approaching the finish line wasn’t an unpopular one when the Eagles dealt him to the Redskins on Easter Sunday in 2010. Sending the greatest offensive player in team history to a division rival not only screamed from the mountaintop that the Eagles were not afraid to start fresh at coach Andy Reid’s favorite position but also that they feared McNabb much less than the rest of the league did. But to end like this — so suddenly, so uncomfortably? Make no mistake, McNabb’s career is spiraling toward its end. This week, reports emerged from D.C. that McNabb had refused to wear a playsheet wristband last season for coach Mike Shanahan because he
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Market for McNabb shrinking quickly
The NFL asserted in a 61-page brief filed Monday to the 8th Circuit Court of Appeals that a judge’s decision to grant an injunction to lift the two-month-old lockout was unreasonable. “This Court should vacate the District Court’s grant of a preliminary injunction and remand with instructions to dismiss or stay the action,” the NFL concluded. Removing the lockout without a new collective bargaining agreement in place would allow better-off teams to sign the best players, tipping the NFL’s competitive balance and damaging the league, its attorneys argued in advance of a June 3 hearing in St. Louis on the appeal of U.S. District Judge Susan Richard Nelson’s decision.
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NFL files brief to appeals court, asks for lockout to remain
News flash: Monday, May 9, 2011. The Eighth Circuit Court of Appeals did not grant NFL owners a permanent stay of Judge Susan Richard Nelson’s lockout injunction. NFL teams, therefore, must open their doors to players, and the league must resume business and start the new year immediately. While that scenario is an unlikely one, there is still the chance that the lockout will be lifted Monday – or some time before the owners’ appeal is heard on June 3 – and the Eagles will be permitted to make the moves that many suspect they will make before the coming season. Trade Kevin Kolb. Add a cornerback. Add a defensive end. Extend Michael Vick’s contract. The latter three likely won’t happen
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Eagles will deal Kolb, but his destination is unknown
The Kevin Kolb rumor mill continues … ESPN’s Adam Schefter said earlier this week on a Seattle radio station that Kevin Kolb could be heading to the NFC West, and that “all signs point” to the Arizona Cardinals. During a mailbag posted today, Schefter expanded on that notion and reported that the Eagles and Cardinals spoke on Day 1 of the NFL Draft before Arizona selected cornerback Patrick Peterson with the fifth overall pick. The league, however, said such conversations were not allowed during the draft. Writes Schefter: The market for Kolb will be similar to what it was before, minus the San Francisco 49ersand Cincinnati Bengals. I still think the Seattle Seahawks will have some
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More scuttlebutt on Kevin Kolb’s future
With the draft behind us, all eyes are turning again to free agency (whenever it happens). For months some Eagles fans have been lusting for Nnamdi Asomugha, the most high-profile free agent on the market and one who would fill a glaring need: a cornerback to start opposite Asante Samuel. But while the Eagles are expected to have money to spend, the question that has to be asked is this: is an All Pro cornerback the right way to spend it when you already have a Pro Bowler in the fold? Do you need two top level corners, or is one star and a strong complement enough, provided you also have talent elsewhere? Let’s look at the top 10 scoring defenses from the 2010-11 regular season. Here were
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Do the Eagles need Asomugha?
Even after one of the top cornerbacks fell to within striking distance, even after the best pass-rushing defensive ends had flown off the board, general manager Howie Roseman said, the Eagles got their man in last weekend’s NFL draft. For seven months, he said, he had eyed Baylor guard Danny Watkins. It started with an August conversation with Art Briles, the Baylor head coach who had mentored Eagles quarterback Kevin Kolb in high school and college. In a visit to the Eagles, Briles raved about his offensive tackle. Roseman knows Briles well, so when he started watching tape in September, video of Watkins’ junior year was one of the first he checked out. He saw toughness, pass protection,
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Roseman says Eagles wanted Watkins all along at No. 1
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