While a lot of the focus for the Los Angeles Rams and the NFL this offseason has been on free agency and the draft, there are currently some other important discussions going on.
A new collective bargaining agreement between the league owners and the NFL Players Association is currently at hand. There two sides have been discussing for a while now but don’t appear to be anywhere close to coming to an agreement, which is a legitimate problem.
With a number of big changes on the horizon, Rams running back Todd Gurley took to Twitter to urge his fellow players to vote against the new propsed CBA:
VOTE NO‼️ https://t.co/oh8btbsvrJ
— Todd Gurley II (@TG3II) March 5, 2020
Gurley’s opposition likely comes at one of the CBA’s biggest changes, the addition of one more game to the regular season. The new agreement creates a 17-game, 18-week season that would strip one game away from the NFL preseason.
With that in mind, the length of the NFL year would not change as preseason would still start in early August. The regular season would simply be pushed one week earlier to start.
Of course, the Rams starters have typically sat out every preseason game for the last few years. With that in mind, it does add a fairly considerable amount of work on starters like Gurley. Aaron Donald replied to Gurley’s tweet, voicing his animosity towards the new CBA as well:
Vote HELL NO
— AD_99 (@AaronDonald97) March 5, 2020
Curiously, the NFLPA player representatives tentatively voted to approve the CBA last week, according to Todd Archer of ESPN. Still, the CBA must be approved by a majority of the NFLPA’s members. Voting will be open for all players until next week.
Under the new CBA, the players would also get an increased percentage of revenue sharing. Owners estimated that just bringing in two more playoff teams would create $150 million in additional league revenue, although many players still feel that not enough will be coming their way.
While a 17-game schedule would certainly take a greater toll on players’ bodies, it seems that the revenue aspect is a large reason for the disagreement as well. With so many star players like Gurley and Donald being as outspoken as they are in opposition of the CBA, it does not seem that this issue will be sorted out any time soon.
