Today Is “#LETUSPLAY” Day For NFL Players

The drama over a potential lockout/strike in the NFL continues today.

The owners are having their annual meetings in Atlanta where they will likely be talking about their upcoming strategy in the NFL labor dispute with the players.

In response the meetings, the players union is sponsoring “#LETUSPLAY” day. Basically this is a PR campaign by the union to make the owner look bad. Players are being advised to take to social media outlets like Twitter and Facebook to declare today “#LETUSPLAY” day to show their opposition to being locked out by the owners.

This PR push is a smart move by the players because it will keep the heat on the owners. There are some that believe that some NFL owners want a lockout so they can force a deal favorable to the league on the players, however the players can block a lockout by decertifying their union. The players have already voted to decertify, so that is one egg they have in their basket.

The NFL has options as well. If a deal is not reached by early March, when the current labor agreement expires, the league could declare an impasse instead of a lockout. In the case of an impasse, the league would implement their last best offer to the players as the new NFL labor rules. The players would then either have to accept the deal or go on strike.

I think it is safe to say this situation is going to get more complicated before it gets solved. Hopefully some owners (I’m looking at you Clark!)will step up this weekend and offer up some ideas to stop the madness.

If things don’t get worked out by early March, there will be no free agency. The draft will still happen because it is a part of the previous labor agreement but after that all league activities would stop until a deal is reached. That means none of the rookies would be able to be signed and there would be no undrafted rookie free agent signings after the draft. In fact, there would be no rookie mini-camps, no OTA’s and no training camp.

There will be no nothing until a deal is reached.

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