(11-29-2012 02:41 PM)Radical Wrote:  Umm... guilty people argue their innocence all the time. Prisons are filled with innocent people... don't you know?

(11-29-2012 02:08 PM)AsylumGuido Wrote:  Payton and Williams have no union

(11-29-2012 02:26 PM)Xanthri Wrote:  Well I will agree with you on one thing....the players (whether they offered bounties or not) should not be held to blame for this....the coaches and DC should....because frankly you can't suspend every member of the defense. I do think the part Goodell got wrong was placing blame on only 4 players....which personally is why I think they are doing the lawsuit....

There were pay for plays....whether it was money personally offered and whether it was money to "hurt" other players remains the question....I think it was....but again I don't have access to the evidence.....on a side note I don't think there is a problem with charging fines internally for players that get flagged during the game and redristibuting that money to someone who made a sack/int/caused a fumble ETC....as long as the intent is NOT to hurt another player.....

For me there is too much evidence that in some form, players were awarded for "cart-offs" and I think that is terrible....

(11-29-2012 02:49 PM)mdrake34 Wrote:  You keep saying this and it never stops being wrong. The coaches have a union, The NFL Coaches Association.

(11-29-2012 02:41 PM)Radical Wrote:  Umm... guilty people argue their innocence all the time. Prisons are filled with innocent people... don't you know?

(11-29-2012 03:03 PM)AsylumGuido Wrote:  The NFLCA is not a union and has never been a union. It is a trade organization and has no bargaining agreement with the NFL. All it does is unites the coaches, but it has absolutely no bargaining power with the NFL as does the NFLPA, which IS a union.

I keep saying this because it is the absolute truth and the key difference between the abilities of the player's and the coach's avenues to fight these wrongs.

(11-29-2012 02:55 PM)AsylumGuido Wrote:  There is no evidence at all that any player was ever awarded for a player being carted off. That is the point. In fact, the players and Coach Vitt have testified that no player ever received any payment if the Saints lost the game or if a penalty occurred on the play OR if a player was seriously injured like a blown out knee or something.

The Saints were doing exactly what you just said you don't have a problem with. Mike Cerullo is the ONLY person that ever claimed that there was ever any intent to injure. The ONLY person.

(11-29-2012 03:36 PM)mdrake34 Wrote:  I stand corrected.
http://profootballtalk.nbcsports.com/2011/05/25/nfl-coaches-association-files-legal-brief-in-support-of-players/
The NFL’s coaches have not yet attempted to form a union. Though that day may eventually come, the trade association that represents the league coaches has taken its boldest action to date, filing a “friend of the court” brief in support of the players’ attempt to lift the lockout.

The brief, refreshingly limited to only 14 pages and largely devoid of jargon, mumbo-jumbo, and/or gobbledygook, characterizes the league’s legal strategy in defending against the Tom Brady antitrust lawsuit as “attempting an end-run around” the 2010 American Needle decision from the U.S. Supreme Court, which stands for the notion that the NFL represents not one business but 32, making it subject to the Sherman antitrust law. More specifically, the coaches argue that the Norris-LaGuardia Act should not generally prevent court orders lifting lockouts, explaining that the league’s reasoning would apply to every possible labor dispute even if the employees contesting a group boycott (i.e., a lockout of a non-union workforce) had never been unionized.

Though the coaches have every reason to be concerned that they eventually will occupy the shoes of the players in an antitrust fight against the owners, the coaches may have overplayed their hand a bit by attempting to argue that they collectively will suffer irreparable harm if the lockout chews significantly into the ability of new coaches to be competitive in 2011. The NFL, like every professional sports league, represents a zero-sum proposition, with a winner for every loser, and a good team for every bad one. Thus, each year the coaches of the worst teams face the possibility of termination.

To the extent that the new coaches will be more likely to struggle in 2011 absent a full offseason, training camp, and preseason, that dynamic actually benefits the members of the NFLCA who are working for established coaching staffs. In other words, the 2011 season (if there is one) will yield good teams and bad teams, exposing the coaches of the bad teams to replacement. In that regard, 2011 will be no different than any other year, regardless of how long the lockout lasts. If anything, the truncated preparation time could help give the coaches of the bad teams a persuasive excuse for avoiding the hot seat, potentially resulting in fewer firings than in a normal year.

Regardless, the brief represents a clear, concrete, overt action by the NFLCA against the NFL, which could be a precursor to further efforts aimed at protecting coaches against heavy-handed ownership actions, either via the formation of a union or the filing of antitrust lawsuits. In the end, the fact that this brief could be a precursor to organized against by the coaches against the owners could be far more significant than anything said in the document itself.