The story you are about to read is not a fictional tale. It was not woven in the macabre mind of horror legend Stephen King. It is not some make believe conspiracy theory that has Fox Mulder traveling the globe. This event could very well happen in the next two years. Sports fans please take a seat because this could be the most horrific news you read in your entire lifetime. The 2008 NFL season is in jeopardy and there is a serious chance for a lockout (gasp!), which means no football until the conflict is resolved.I hope all of you have had a moment to collect your thoughts and evaluate what you have just read because it is indeed sobering news. Can anyone imagine a Sunday afternoon in October with no NFL football? Neither can I my friends, because the thought is too damn horrific! However, no matter how unappealing this football-less fate sounds, it is a very distinct possibility. Give me the post-apocalyptic future of the Mad Max films. Or even the religious zealot’s idea of hell on Earth. You know when God grabs all those saintly people to bring to heaven while leaving us sinners behind. Fine, don’t take me God, but please leave me my NFL football.
Like I mentioned above this isn’t some whacked out conspiracy theory, but an inevitability if the NFL and the NFL Players Association do not sign a new collective bargaining agreement. Yes non-believers a strike or lockout would not happen until the year 2008, but the count down to Armageddon would start this season if an agreement is not reached by March 3rd. That means each of your favorite teams could be infected by the “lockout virus” starting this year.
If your favorite team’s payroll is well over the salary cap in 2006, this happens to be the worst possible year to be in that position. With no CBA agreement in place the cap will stay the same in 2006, instead of moving up as it usually does, and salary negotiations become much more complicated. With no deal in place it will be hard to backload contracts with big money and most of the impact will hit this year with the smaller cap. This means teams well over the cap looking to get better through free agency are going to have a very difficult time. By the way my beloved Oakland Raiders are $31 million over the cap, highest in the league, and desperately need some free agents to get better. Talk about a harrowing feeling.
In 2007 the madness would continue. No salary cap would be in place and the NFL could mutate into the most frightening, hideous beast I can imagine…Major League Baseball! A few high revenue teams would emerge to fight for the Lombardi Trophy every year ala the New York Yankees and Boston Red Sox in baseball. I cannot think of a more loathsome feeling than seeing certain NFL’s teams turn into the Kansas City Royals because they don’t have enough revenue flow to compete with the big market teams. If you want to visualize that feeling in the pit of my stomach, just picture John Hurt in the horror classic Alien.
This leads all of us thirty-something individuals back to those nightmarish visions of our childhood; flashbacks of strange playoff formats in 1982 or those hideous “scabs” masquerading as NFL players in 1987. Certainly these were just long ago traumas that could never take place again…could they? In 2008 this could all turn into a living nightmare. If Paul Tagliabue and Gene Upshaw don’t sit-down and hammer out that new CBA we could be witness to a schism in the NFL world and the bleak thought of a year without football. That means Sundays would evolve into some sort of free day where one’s only option would be to spend time with family and loved ones. The horror. The horror…