NFL Collective Bargaining Agreement: Why Twitter Is Crushing The Union

As much as you would like to sit back and pray that there will be an agreement reached in order for the sports audience to experience a full season of football in the fall, the chances of that seem slim to none. There have been lock outs in the past, but it seems like there is a new determinant in this case, social networking.

Twitter, to be exact, is beginning to be the outlet for many disgruntled players and executives to voice their opinions, helpful and hurtful, to the public. Whether they are deleted immediately after or not has nothing to do with the damage their words create the moment they hit send.

Antonio Cromartie's latest aim at self humiliation is by far his greatest and most ignorant. After going on at his locker about how both sides involved in the CBA talks need to stop fussing over money, and used a few other choice words that I will not trickle all over my article, other players sounded off in support of their union leaders.

Ray Lewis commented that leaders are servants first and that they have his full support, while Seahawks QB took a rather raw approach to Cromartie. He posted on his twitter account that someone should ask Cromartie if he knows what CBA even stands for. As hilarious as they may have been for his followers, he deleted it, but not before the already shaken up and defeated Jets' Cornerback heard about it.

Cromartie decided to tweet in response saying that Hasselbeck should be a man and not delete his tweet and that he would smash his face in. While that response was extremely unwarranted and shows immense reason why he should be directed towards psych evaluation before stepping on the field again, Hasselbeck apologized.

But the damage had already been done. Not only will Cromartie probably not except his apology, but the crumble of Union support is beginning to slip through the cracks and make no mistake, the powers that be are taking note of the separation. Cromartie cannot be punished for his comments made publicly against the Union but somebody definitely needs to pull him to the side and tell him that it is not only himself that he should be worrying about.

If the players have any hope of achieving what they want out of the deal, they must provide the appearance of a united front, no matter how false it may be, perception becomes reality and if you cannot convince your opposition that you will stand strong through whatever may happen, you will fall.

Not only that but Green Bay Packers injured players taking to twitter to voice their dislike of how their team photo situation was being handled and even active players making a twitter stand against Bears' quarterback Jay Cutler shows that there are holes in the Union, and not so small ones. It's unfortunate that these players are allowing social networking to dictate the direction of their futures, but until the consequences of their words hit hard, this will not be the last headline created from 140 characters or less.