Changes to the Collective Bargaining Agreement have caused the holdout to become the hold-in, where players who want new deals show up but don’t practice until they get their contracts.
It’s less about withholding services and more about avoiding injury. And the teams typically go along with it, to a point, even if they could (if they wanted) play hardball and tell the player to get to work.
For the players who are negotiating deals and choose to practice, there’s a calculated risk. It came up last night in the context of Packers tight end Tucker Kraft, who’ll practice without an extension as he re-establishes himself after a torn ACL suffered last November.
Other players who are practicing without new deals surely have their reasons. But it’s still a risk.
Consider the comments of Patriots coach Mike Vrabel regarding cornerback Christian Gonzalez practicing while negotiating.
“Listen, we’ve talked about this contract,” Vrabel said. “It’ll either get done, and when it gets done, that’ll be the progress that’s made. Everybody that’s involved is working hard. I cannot express the professionalism that Gonzo has started camp with. It’s clear that he wants to improve, that he wants to be the best at his craft and at that position. I think that he’s made that known by the way he’s come out here to practice.”
That’s good. But here’s the thing. If lightning strikes, as it tends to do during training camp, the negotiations will end. Immediately. And they won’t continue until Gonzalez is back and able to show that he can perform at a high level.
It’s true for any player who has chosen to practice while negotiations happen. Gonzalez, Seahawks cornerback Devon Witherspoon, Colts running back Jonathan Taylor, and any other player who is practicing while waiting for a new deal.
So that’s why players like Falcons running back Bijan Robinson and Lions running back Jahmyr Gibbs aren’t practicing. With a torn ACL or a blown-out Achilles, the offers go from wherever they currently are to zero dollars and zero cents.
