As owners, players squabble over CBA, they best not forget fans

Friday, February 04 2011

The cloud already has begun to form.

Maybe the players will deny it this week, and maybe the fans will think instead about how to procure autographs and memorabilia. But the darkening cloud is there, high in the sky, whether or not anybody wants to look.

The stink of the Collective Bargaining Agreement's expiration in March will infest the Dallas - Fort Worth area this week. How could it not? There are only 60 minutes of football remaining this season, and then ... nothing. For now, anyway. Which means what? This could be the last NFL game we'll see for a long while. And no matter how much the players want to keep it from entering through the backdoor of their brains, the uncertainty sits there, menacing them like a cloud ready to unleash a torrent of rain.

"It is in our minds," Steelers defensive end Brett Keisel said Monday. "None of us know what's going to happen. Hopefully it gets worked out, because we have the greatest game in America . The owners make a lot of money, the players make a lot of money. We have to find a way to make it work."

Keisel hopes that dark cloud doesn't envelope the festivities this week. He says the focus should be on the Packers and the Steelers, because the two teams have worked too damn hard to get to this point. He's right, but the issues aren't going away.

The owners still want to drop the players' share of the total revenue from 58 percent to 47 percent while expanding the schedule to 18 games. The players still don't want to concede those points (less pay for more work, they ask?). The owners still say they won't make money otherwise. The players still request the owners to open up their financial records and prove it.

But the two sides better not take the fans for granted.

Take a guy like Tom Prechtl, for instance.

On Monday, he stood with 100 other Steelers fans, behind a rope at the Omni Forth Worth hotel and watched the media shuffle in for the Pittsburgh news conferences. He unfurled a yellow Terrible Towel, and he watched a TV reporter run through his schtick in front of a camera. Prechtl is a Steelers fan. A big Steelers fan. He's been rooting for the Rooneys since he graduated from high school 55 years ago, and he makes the five-hour round trip drive every home football Sunday from Ridgway , Pa. , to Pittsburgh to cheer them on in person.

He's the guy the NFL owners and the NFL Players Association don't want to upset.

He's got history with his team, and he's invested in the present. The future? He's not so sure about that.

Prechtl predicts the NFL owners won't lock out the NFL's players, and he, for one, doesn't sense the dark cloud that hangs over this week's proceedings. But he does know this: if the NFL cancels games next season, he'll turn his attention elsewhere.

"I'll just watch college football," he said, while straining to catch a glimpse of Hines Ward's cowboy hat or maybe the flowing locks of Keisel's beard. "I really don't worry about it, because I think they're going to work it out. They know if they had a labor dispute and didn't play, they would hurt the sport of football. If they don't play, it's going to hurt both sides."

Then, I asked Prechtl a question to which I was sure I knew the answer. So I asked, "If there is a lockout next year and you can't watch football on Sundays -- even if it's only for six or eight games -- will you be less of a Steelers fan?" and thought he would say something like, "No, of course not. I love my Steelers. I'll always be a big Steelers fan."

Except he said this, "Yeah, I would a little bit. I'm a season ticket holder, and I've been rooting for them since 1956."

So, a lockout would test your loyalty, then? "Yes, it sure would."

Maybe the NFL figures their fans won't be that fickle, that if they lose a couple games it wouldn't be a big deal. They're probably right. Prechtl says otherwise.

Surely, the NFL can't be stupid enough to take the risk, though.

On Monday, the NFL and the NFLPA announced that the two sides will meet Saturday to continue labor negotiations in a formal bargaining session, and that's a positive sign. Maybe. But from all the reports we read, an agreement is not forthcoming any time soon. Instead, we'll likely see more posturing and the sky will continue to grow darker.

On Super Bowl Sunday, the sky will be heavy with rain clouds. As the game nears its end, the drizzle will begin. Thunder will begin to sound. Lightning will strike. But you won't notice until the game is over.

The retractable roof at Cowboys Stadium will be closed Sunday. It's only until you walk outside that you'll notice that the NFL and its players have been caught in a downpour. (source CBS Sports)