Silence and secrecy continue to shroud NFLPA's executive director selection process
Last Thursday, a decision was supposedly less than a week away. Five days later, there's still no news.
The NFL Players Association, reportedly due to introduce a new executive director to union employees on Thursday, June 29, currently seems to be no closer to picking an eventual successor to DeMaurice Smith, who has held the job since 2009.
Ben Fischer of Sports Business Journal reported last week that NFLPA staff had been asked to attend a meet-and-greet with the next executive director later this week. Through the first two business days of the current week, no news has emerged regarding the selection process.
As PFT noted over the weekend, players can't get any information about the supposed finalists from their elected representatives. And no one seems to be talking to anyone about the people vying for the job.
One source with general knowledge of the process pointed out to PFT on Tuesday that last week's reporting from SBJ potentially is not accurate, and that an executive director will not be selected this week. As Fischer himself recently tweeted, the NFLPA Constitution requires the board of player representatives to be informed of no fewer than two and no more than four finalists at least 30 days before any vote .
Unless the union intends to violate — or has secretly altered — its governing document, there can be no valid vote until: (1) the player representatives have been informed of the finalists; and (2) at least 30 days have passed. Thus, even if the NFLPA hopes to keep the names of the finalists secret for as long as possible (and it has), the names apparently can be kept secret only until 30 days before the vote.
That said, who will challenge the union if the union violates its in-house procedures? Who would have standing to sue? As we mentioned on Sunday, the union benefits from the fact that the players largely aren't engaged.
Look at it this way — if any player or player representative were inclined to make a big stink about the possibility of a vote less than 30 days after the player representatives are informed of the finalists, they'd already be making a stink.
No one is making a stink. And, frankly, that's one of the reasons why the whole thing is starting to smell.
