EXCLUSIVE VIDEO ProPlayerInsiders sat down with Executive Director of the NFLPA DeMaurice Smith shortly after he and NFL commissioner Roger Goodell announced that football was back. In this first part of our series, Smith talks about his thoughts going into the negotiations, revenue sharing and the importance of having a game that is both safe and profitable.
“The great thing about football is that you do know at some point football is going to get played,” says Smith when asked about some of the uncertainty that pervaded the negotiations over the past several months.
“Under what conditions football would return was the real question,” he says. “Whether our players … would come back to football united and stronger or whether they came back to football in a fractured state where their health and safety … and economics aren’t moving in the right direction.”
Unity of the players, revenue sharing and health and safety for all players, past present and future, were the key points that Smith, along with the other player leaders, focused on beginning in March of 2009 when he was elected.
“Over the last two years, what we have tried to do is to say [to the players] it is okay to love and to want to engage in something that is your passion. At the same time doing so in a game that can be profitable and fun [isn’t] mutually exclusive from being safe and taking care of you when [your] days of playing are over.”
On the economics of the deal, Smith said, “We were in a situation where the shares of all revenue was decreasing quickly. The system by which player compensation was modeled included costs coming off the top that players had virtually no ability to manage.”
That’s one reason why the players, early on in the negotiations, were demanding the league “open their books” to them as the players were essentially penalized by a reduction in their share of the revenue with no ability to review or manage the increasing costs. That’s not an issue in the new deal.
“What we have today is a band of compensation that is unique in sports. It guarantees to the players a higher percentage of television revenue. It includes a floor of all revenue that we can never drop below for 10 years. It also includes a ceiling that allows us to share up to 48.5% of all revenue.”
Smith believes the security and the predictability of the deal is good for the game of football and all its constituents: players, owners and fans. Coming off the longest work stoppage in NFL history, we agree.
