Following the labor rollercoaster of Thursday night, Florio tried to make sense of what happened.
Some of the problems came from business, and some from simple human relations. Many players didn’t appreciate the public pressure put on them by the owners and fought back.
Now 36 hours later, it seems like the emotions are subsiding.
“I think guys at first were angry [Thursday night] because the first time we heard about the proposal was on TV when they voted on it. You need to negotiate and do it the right way,” Bengals alternate player rep Reggie Kelly told Joe Reedy of the Cincinnati Enquirer. “People have started to cool off. It’s not about egos and personal feelings. It’s a business. All in all it’s going to work out and we’re going to be ready to play.”
There are very real issues to settle before an agreement, but we don’t see any deal breakers in the group. The free agency timeline the NFL set out Thursday has clearly been disrupted but not by that much. Yet.
Put emotions aside, and there is still time to reach an agreement without much further damage to the game.