NFL, NFLPA Meet to Discuss Negotiations for New Collective Bargaining Agreement

The NFL and NFLPA released a joint statement saying they're committed to meeting regularly to discuss a new collective bargaining agreement after a meeting Tuesday. 

"Today, the members of the NFL's Management Council and the NFLPA's Executive Committee met to discuss negotiations for a new collective bargaining agreement," the statement read. "The League and the Union have committed to meet regularly in the coming months, which will involve staff, NFL leadership, members of the NFLPA Executive Committee and Player Representatives."

The current CBA, which was signed following the 2011 lockout, runs through the 2020 season. There has been widespread speculation about a potential work stoppage when the current deal expires; the NFLPA sent a memo to players in 2017 warning them to begin saving money.

Los Angeles Rams running back Todd Gurley and San Francisco 49ers cornerback Richard Sherman have been among the prominent players to say they expect a lockout.

"For right now, we just need to come together and be prepared," Gurley told Cameron DaSilva of Rams Wire last summer. "You always have to be prepared. We'll just come together, pull up a couple different ideas and go on from there. You definitely always have to be prepared for certain situations."

 "It's going to happen, so it's not like guys are guessing on that one," Sherman told reporters in October. "... there was a lockout before. We don't plan on changing anything about the deal we currently have right now, so I don't think it's going to be negotiated before the end of the CBA, so it's going to cause a lockout and we'll deal with it from there."

The deal struck in 2011 was considered a major win for the owners, featuring players getting a smaller cut of revenue, along with a new rookie wage scale being implemented. 

The relationship between players and the ownership base is arguably worse now than it was at the height of the lockout. Players have consistently criticized the autonomy of commissioner Roger Goodell and had a vehement disagreement with some members of league ownership regarding the right to protest during the national anthem. 

The public bluster of players seems to be that they're preparing for a fight. DeMaurice Smith, the NFLPA's executive director, compared negotiations to war last February.

"Everyone likes to posit that there would be some kind of extension," Smith told reporters. "This collective bargaining agreement was painfully negotiated at a time when the league secured a $4 billion war chest to basically put us out of business. There are a lot of great things about the collective bargaining agreement, but whether it's the great things or the thing that we don't like, collective bargaining agreements are grinding, exhausting elements that come out of two parties that want fundamentally different things. So, I could never imagine a world where you would simply put a page on the back of it that says, 'This document is now extended until 2035.'"

The public statement at least gives some hope that this "war" could be a short one.