On Monday, the NFL drew a line in the sand. Since then, the NFL Players Association and the four players facing a talk-or-else mandate have been deciding whether to step across it.
“We’ve spent the last few days advising our players and letting them know in a completely honest and open way exactly what their options are, what they want to do,” NFLPA president Eric Winston said regarding Packers linebackers Clay Matthews and Julius Peppers, Steelers linebacker James Harrison, and free-agent defensive lineman Mike Neal during a Wednesday morning appearance on PFT Live. “Each case is different, each guy is different. Each guy might want to do different things so no matter what we’re going fight for them like crazy like we always do, and we’re going go and have our players’ backs. That’s what we’re all about and that’s all we can do and that’s what we’re going to continue to do.”
It’s clear that Winston isn’t pleased with the position the NFL has taken.
“It’s definitely peak silliness and peak unprofessionalism,” Winston said. “It is what it is and unfortunately we’ve gone from this place where NFL [business] used to be conducted in a super-professional way by men that have played this game for a long time and a front office that has run this great game for a long time to now it’s almost seemingly like these scripts that are pulled from WWE Smackdown or something like that. It’s hard to understand why this is being allowed to continue on by some ownership that has some control but it is and we’re going to keep fighting. We’re going to keep advising our players in an open and honest way exactly about what their rights are and about what their options are and we’ll continue to go down this road and we’ll continue to fight for our players.”
And so it will be up to the four players to decide whether to fight this. What would Winston do if he were one of them?
“That’s a great question,” Winston said. “I just haven’t really put myself in that situation. You know me, I’d probably be more apt to fight. I told our guys that want to get this done and get this over, with the season coming up as well. It’s hard for me to say that one guy should do this or one guy should do that. Like I said I think every guy’s perception and what angle they’re coming from is different, and that’s why they have to make the decision. I can’t make it for them and nobody else can make it for them.”
Regardless of how this turns out, Winston hopes the fans and the media are beginning to realize how business gets done.
“I keep on thinking that every time we come to one of these instances, you know?” Winston said. “That everybody’s finally going to realize what we’ve been talking about now for a long, long time and there’s just a couple of things that really strike out to me is the bully mentality that they’ve used for quite some time. When they can’t get their way they’re going to bully you and they’re going to try to bully you and maybe sadly that’s where negotiations and things like that have gone to in America. That’s something I’m starting to see a lot more of. But on top of it, it’s also like you get to this point of where do we go from here? How do we resolve any of these differences? And it’s tough. That’s the most frustrating thing for me I guess.”
The four players have until August 25 to decide whether to submit to the interviews or to fight. Presumably, there’s a way to fight that secures a resolution of the question of whether the players are obligated to submit to interviews based on uncorroborated allegations of PED use before they actually have to decide to voluntarily give up game checks.
