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		NFL too smart to cancel season By Tom Zulewski March 4, 2006

	Unlike the NHL, which completely canceled its season last year, and luckily were forgiven by the fans and are doing a good business except for the Pittsburgh Penguins. The other Pittsburgh team the football one, and the league they belong to are hoping the powers that be NFL Commissioner Paul Tagliabue and NFL Players Association President Cecil Upshaw are hoping to come to grips on some agreement as the NFL Collective Bargaining Agreement is coming to an end soon. The major stalemate is the salary cap which ends and beginning July 2006 , the NFL and players will have a contract without a salary cap in place having Tagliabue warning Upshaw to have an agreement in place with a cap or the season will not begin thus a lockout by the owners. Upshaw has made it firm to Tagliabue that the players will not go for any kind of salary cap whatsoever. The two met last week for a second go round as they met one at the Super Bowl in Detroit and could not come to any agreement. In this second meeting Tagliabue and Upshaw told the assembled press that they were still far apart. It’s a very good possibility there is going to be a work stoppage and the owner will not deal without a cap in place and the players otherwise. The key to this situation that both sides have now broke off talks and that's disturbing. As popular as the NFL has been the last time they walked away was in 1987 when the season was halved 16 games reduced down to nine games. The NFL had that very funky playoff system between the four and five Detroit Lions actually got in shockingly. The NFL for all its money is finally getting all its issues and the owners are saying, "its for the good of the league, its for the good of the league" and some of the owners are loosing the attitude and its for making the most possible dollar and players be darned and the owners saying "we need to spend more money on getting good players and we don't want the system apparently to be in place to do that." For all the times it was working you have to wonder if the NFL is in any kind of a labor mess and after this past week's meeting they are. Especially with the fact the 2007 season is going to have a cap. Players have made it very adamant they will not go for a salary cap. If there is any kind of work stoppage especially a lock out that cancels the season look out. There is no reason at this point for the league to shut down because of this but if the NFL owners lockout or the players call a strike watch all that is good with the NFL start to erode and more reasons for people who are complaining about things like labor stoppages to raise their voices some more. Its just a game for crying out loud and its a game we always enjoyed watching you are an entertainment product with the likeliness of a short career but what in the world does it prove the players make too much money as it is go back to the old days when players were making 50-60 thousand dollars and had to scrap by and have jobs in the off season. We're spoiled now we don't have to do this kind of thing and its simply ludicrous, the NHL lost with their lockout mess and don't be surprised if the NFL players loose too I mean they've done things for the good of the league for so long now its all about the money. The players and the owners have all this money and they don't know what to do with it and they're all fighting for it. Tom Zulewski co-hosts Sportstalk on 1430 KVVN San Jose and 1110 KLIB Sacramento each weekend stay up and enjoy it awhile.