Free agency a potential bargaining chip for players

Colleague Michael Silver correctly encouraged players last week to demand appropriate concessions in the next collective bargaining agreement before accepting an 18-game season. One possible demand: a faster track to free agency.

A prolonged regular season is coming no matter what. Players can try to stand against the tidal wave of support for more real games (and less of the exhibition season). However, when that wave features somewhere in the area of $1 billion in added revenue, the players would be much better served to grab surfboards and ride it out, even if it's going to be rough.

In doing so, players need to be clever, combining the momentum of an 18-game schedule with the realities of free agency. If the owners want more games each season, they should give up one year toward free agency. Specifically, players should become unrestricted free agents after their third season rather than having to wait until after their fourth, which was the case when the league had a salary cap.

The reason is simple: Under an 18-game schedule, most players will get to 54 games of service time after three years. Under the rules prior to this season (which changed when the owners opted out of the old CBA), it took 64 games.

While players would be getting to free agency faster, there is justification. Several doctors affiliated with NFL teams (who declined to be identified because their research hasn't been verified yet) believe that both acute and normal wear-and-tear injuries will increase at a higher rate because already worn-out players are going to be playing more. Subsequently, players need to be rewarded faster for being exposed to more harm.

"I think it's pretty consistent with most research we've seen," one team doctor said this week. "If you have an athlete – any patient really – who is fatigued, the chances of further injury become greater the more they play. We just don't really know how much greater."

While some owners may squawk at the idea of reducing free agency from four to three years, there are other tradeoffs that the players can make. For instance, this situation would open a door to having NFL draft picks sign three-year, slotted deals similar to the NBA, thereby solving one of the main problems that contributes to the growth in signing bonuses for top picks. In addition, it would lead to players who have proven themselves getting proper compensation earlier.

(Note: An ancillary benefit of doing three-year deals for draft picks is that it would allow for the diversion of the $100 million or so that the league and NFL Players Association have talked about putting into benefits for retired players.)

In response, owners will likely ask for some further ability to keep players, something akin to the existing "franchise" tag for each team. Again, there are a number of easy solutions. Rather than having restricted free agency, teams could be given a similar type of tender system for any player who had completed his third year. This would allow teams a year to keep a critical player, such as a quarterback, with whom they have been unable to work out a long-term contract.

The bottom line is this: If the owners are trying to raise revenue by increasing the length of the season, there is obviously good and bad to it. The good part is there's a huge chunk of money to be made. The bad is that players are once again being asked to go into the breech.

The players need to be compensated for that.

Elway talks cards

Hall of Fame quarterback John Elway celebrated the first anniversary of his second marriage on Sunday. On Monday, he celebrated a little bit of his youth, talking about trading cards for the Topps Company.

"I remember getting cards when I was a kid and it was like opening that present on Christmas," said Elway, who admitted to being a little partial to basketball cards because his favorite athlete as a kid was Los Angeles Lakers great Jerry West. Like most of us in our 40s or 50s, Elway remembers getting the oversized football cards of the 1970s.

"Oh yeah, I had some of those, too," Elway said. "When I was a player, it was always great to get your card, too. I have all of those put away somewhere."

These days, Topps is giving collectors a chance to get some of those cards from long ago. The company is doing a "Gridiron Giveaway" with code cards inserted in one of every six packs of 2010 Topps football cards.

Fans can enter the code from the card by going to toppsgridiron.com to win authentic, vintage cards, including rare rookie cards such as the 1957 Johnny Unitas, 1958 Jim Brown, 1965 Joe Namath, 1971 Terry Bradshaw and 1984 Elway. There are other prizes available, such as signed helmets and cards.

That crazy Belichick

One of my favorite tasks each day (right next to pulling weeds in the flower beds) is to read the transcripts sent out by each team of the coach and player interviews they record (BTW, the Buffalo Bills are particularly diligent in this category).

One of the best is to read New England Patriots coach Bill Belichick's Q&A sessions. Belichick's commentary is so consistently dry that it's funny. Once in awhile, he mixes in some terrific sarcasm, such as this exchange midway through August.

Question from an unnamed reporter: "So, no injury report that you have to put out until Sept. 8th?"

Belichick: "Yeah, we've got a little ways. I'm looking forward to that one. It's kind of like Christmas. I just count the days down until that injury report comes and then we can do our first one."

Unnamed reporter: "There is a report that [Tom] Brady had his fingers tape and maybe he knocked it on someone's helmet. Is there any concern about that?"

Belichick: "I don't think it's life-threatening, no."

Unnamed reporter: "But is it game-threatening?"

Belichick: "I can't wait for that first injury report to come out. That's the highlight of my week – one of them."

This and that

• The fascinating thing about the fall of Arizona Cardinals quarterback Matt Leinart(notes) is that he has the gall to question coach Ken Whisenhunt. Over the past three years, Whisenhunt did everything but beg Leinart, who reportedly is being shopped, to become a stronger leader on the field and in the locker room. Early in August, Whisenhunt even went out of his way to defend Leinart's offseason work with one reporter, telling the reporter that Leinart had been "excellent" during OTA and other offseason activity. That flew in the face of what other people in the organization had to say about Leinart, who has never escaped the image of being a guy more infatuated with his own image than the actual results. Now that Leinart has questioned Whisenhunt's decision-making, he has lost the last person who actually was pushing for him to succeed.

• While Cincinnati Browns owner Mike Brown(notes) deserves criticism for his willingness to take chances on so many bad-character players over the years, he also deserves credit for never holding his coaches responsible for those decisions. By contrast, some owners have a tendency to blame the failure of players on coaches, even when those athletes are obvious risks. Instead, the Bengals have had terrific stability with their coaching staff in recent years, a factor that helped make the team so good last season and has put it back among the list of contenders this year.

• A great highlight of training camp was when Cincinnati wide receiver Terrell Owens(notes) was asked about some Twitter comments by Cleveland Browns cornerback Brandon McDonald(notes), who was trying to amp the competition between the Bengals and Browns. When asked about McDonald, Owens responded, "Who?" When the reporter repeated that it was Brandon McDonald, Owens said: "I don't even know who that it. Is he related to Ronald McDonald?"

• While I have a personal relationship with former New York Giants wide receiver Plaxico Burress(notes) (I co-wrote his book "Giant"), I have to say that New York state's latest denial to allow him work release is ridiculous. Burress made a huge mistake and deserved some time in jail for his carelessness with a gun, but he is still not the person the state is trying to target with this gun law and he ultimately hurt no one but himself. He is hardly a serious threat to society.

• As of Wednesday afternoon, the San Diego Union-Tribune had yet to respond to the letter from lawyer Howard Weitzman regarding client Vincent Jackson(notes). Weitzman said he planned to wait until Thursday to see if the newspaper responded to his demand for a retraction and apology regarding a report about Jackson's financial state.