Bryan Burwell

The inevitable showdown between the billionaire NFL owners and the millionaire players already has begun with a three-year head start on the potential end of pro football’s extended labor peace.

Earlier this week, NFL commissioner Roger Goodell surprised no one when he announced that the owners had voted to get out of a 26-month-old collective bargaining agreement. That was the first warning shot of trouble to come. The owners and players are going to have one of those long and uncomfortable labor haggles as they decide how to split their incredibly profitable multibillion dollar pie.

Other than the usual predictable chatter, what was surprising was how every word coming out of the mouths of both Goodell and players association head Gene Upshaw were so lacking in contentious verbiage. It was all matter of fact. Upshaw said he wasn’t surprised. Goodell wasn’t crying poor mouth. He wasn’t painting a picture of financial gloom and doom for the owners, which is one of the most unconventional pre-negotiating strategies I’ve ever seen in more than 30 years of covering pro sports.

“We’re not in dire financial straits,” Goodell told reporters. “We’ve never intimated that. The deal just isn’t working for us.”

So what’s all the commotion about?

It’s about money, of course. It’s always about money. The owners and the players have this peculiar notion that they both would like to enjoy a bigger slice of the big pie. We’ll save the debate about who deserves more and who deserves less for another day. The simple truth is, owners deserve to make a profit, but players deserve to reap a healthy portion of that profit, too. So they have several years to figure out the percentages.

But there is something else Goodell said something that stuck with me wrong. It was a wonderful sound bite that essentially captured the spirit of what the owners say they’re ready to fight for, and revealed exactly what’s wrong with the way they think:

“The cost of generating revenues are going up,” said Goodell. “The players share in the revenues, but not in the costs.”

This is what’s always been wrong with the NFL owners. Essentially, they think that NFL players reap all the benefits without assuming any of the risks that the owners experience, which I strongly suggest is nonsense.

The players may not assume the hefty financial risks that these wealthy businessmen experience, but their risks are just as costly and a great deal more frightening. It’s called physical risk. It’s the unspoken, but understood acceptance that every time they put on those pads, some career-ending, or life-threatening injury could happen.

Did Buffalo tight end Kevin Everett assume a risk when he took the playing field last season and was temporarily paralyzed? Perhaps Goodell should have been with me last week when I ran into NFL Hall of Famer Dan Dierdorf. I saw the legendary offensive lineman at a social function and he came limping through the doors of this grand suburban country club on two surgically replaced hips that forced him to walk like a man twice his age. You want to talk about costs and risks? How much risk does a man incur when he wages violent athletic battles in the NFL trenches for five or 10 years?

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Or maybe at the next Super Bowl, Goodell and the owners could take a little field trip through the main press center during the week and sit along radio row as all the ex-players come limping in there with their twisted and mangled limbs caused by years of abuse from playing careers.

Or maybe they could quit ducking the issue of the shamefully inadequate health benefits to retired players who are suffering from physical and mental disabilities. They could talk to Conrad Dobler about the unbearable pain he suffers, or the wife of Hall of Fame tight end John Mackey. Mackey suffers from Alzheimer’s disease brought on by football-related concussions.

No risks? No costs? Are you kidding me?

That’s like saying that the hunter who pays for the hunting license, expensive equipment and ammunition is the only one who is assuming all the costs and risks in big game hunting.

Tell that to the bear.

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