Today's owners meeting today in Chicago, where Commissioner Roger Goodell is reportedly working hard to convince 32 owners to accept the supposedly 80-85% completed collective bargaining agreement, several 'football-operations' people are present.
From Mark Maske at the Washington Post:
In addition to the owners, there are a lot of football-operations people on hand today--Rich McKay, Scott Pioli, Bill Polian, Bruce Allen.
This is interesting because football ops people haven't really been part of this process. Maybe they're there in case final details need to be worked out, such as free agency, rookie salary cap, team salary cap, etc. More from Maske:
The football operations people presumably are here to discuss issues like how free agency would work after a potential deal with players.
Regardless of the reasons, it certainly sounds like good news that people like Polian are there.
Going into the meeting, the feeling was certain owners might try to derail the new agreement in an effort to break the players union. It only takes nine owners saying 'No' to achieve this. Fortunately, Maske is reporting that 'the dissent among the owners is not enough to generate the nine votes that would be needed to block a potential deal.'
Jim Irsay, the 'maverick' in all this lockout idiocy, said it best over the weekend:
I hope Owners n Players really hate this new CBA,with a passion,when we're done..then Fans r happy n the media will chirp n heroes crowned!
This game is about the fans. The owners are useless, and the players don't make the money they make without fans, like you and me, buying their jerseys. The CBA that is created should be something the fans want, not the players or the owners. At the end of the day, football ceases to be relevant if fans loose faith in the parity the NFL has provided. Thus, this new CBA should, hopefully, be a lot like the last CBA. Because football was pretty damn good (and profitable) under that deal.