Now, THIS is a powerful message (Wallace Matthews Column today)

I think you're talking about the Line of Duty Disability Fund, which was collectively bargained as a benefit for existing players and extended to retirees. Nothing wrong with that. A union negotiating with the league to "set aside" money would definitely be a conflict of interest because that money would then be unavailable to the current members, assuring them a smaller pie from which to negotiate.

 

This problem was actually hinted at by George Plimpton in the book "Mad Ducks and Bears," published in 1973, in a chapter in which he described meeting with some former NFL players who had played from the 1930s to the 1950s, and about how no players who retired prior to 1959 got any pensions at all, and many were broke and desitute in their senior years, and how it came to be an issue in the late 1960s, and how Vince Lombardi had attempted to put some pressure on the owners and union to make some provision for older players, and pretty much had gotten blown off by both sides.

Of course, the players who played from the 1930s to 1950s are mostly dead now, so for the most part that problem is solved. For the players whose careers have taken place in the four decades since, it's not so simple.

 

Real Sports on HBO had a good story about this (the NFLPA ignoring the older players) last week, I believe. Ditka was on there as well. As was Conrad Dobler, who looks like a shell of his former self and who basically said he'd kill himself when the time came rather than endure too much pain.

 

Kudos to Matthews. Anyone who exposes the hypocrisy of the NFL is alright in my book. You won't find any NFL beat writers/columnists doing it. They're too busy bowing to the altar of Tagliabue/Goodell and realizing they're a part of the most successful league in sports and don't want to do anything that could possibly ruin a good thing.

I hate the NFL.

 

Ragu,

I'm dropping the quote function because it was getting too long. There's a big difference between the league and the union both putting moeny into a program (like the Industry Growth Fund in baseball) and the union trying to negotiate benefits for players who are no longer in the collective bargaining unit.

If you're saying the union should help the league pay for improving the retirees' benefits, that's even more illogical. The former players were employed by the NFL, not the union.

 

You can't seem to understand that a union getting together with an employer and deciding to "set aside" the employer's money for a group other than the collective bargaining unit is negotiating and it is unethical. A union's sole responsibility is to represent its current bargining unit. I've told you a number of times now that the disability fund was collectively bargained as a benefit for current members and extended to former members but you can't seem to grasp that very obvious difference. You also can't seem to grasp that it's never been the financial responsibility of any union in any industry to provide benefits to former employees. Here's a novel concept: Let the former employees go back to their employers and ask them to pay for improved benefits. The fact is that it's well within the NFL's power to improve the benefits for former employees. The union has no standing to negotiate the benefits nor any obligation to pay them.

 

Sounds as if the NFLPA is as bad as the NHLPA was under Alan Eagleson. Does Gene Upshaw have the Eagle's phone number?

 

I've tried to explain two basic concepts to you:

1) That there are legal restraints/limits to how much a union can do to negotiate increased benefits for retired employees. I realize you don't want to believe me so I suggested you speak to a labor lawyer or human resources expert. Instead, your response has been to to point to joint charitable programs or benefits collectively bargained on behalf of current players and extended to retirees, neither of which are comparable to this situation in which a class of retirees (that doesn't include current players) wants to come back decades later and renegotiate its pension plan.

2) That the employers of the retirees -- rather than the current employees or the entity that bargains on their behalf -- are the people who (presumably) didn't adequately compensate these people in the first place and are therefore responsible to the extent any entity could be responsible. While it would be nice and perhaps the right thing to do, the NFL has absolutely no legal obligation to negotiate with this class of retirees. The retirees agreed to a certain level of compensation when they played and, now, decades later when they realize they should have done better by themsevles, are coming hat in hand. With no real leverage, they have decided to try and "embarrass" the league into improving their retirement benefits.

This is the reality, Ragu. Nothing phantom about it. Now, what do you think will happen if 40 years from now you go to your former employer as a retiree and ask to improve your retirement plan because that no-contribution 401K plan doesn't really cut it afterall? Probably the company will say, 'Our mistake!' and retroactively make a big contribution, right?

 

Pension somehow equals disability fund? I'm confused...