With the NFLPA suing the NFL for collusion earlier today in U.S. Court in Minnesota, NFLPA outside counsel Jeffrey Kessler today said that the union found out about the alleged collusion after reading media reports in which league officials "started to spill their guts" to the media. The NFLPA agreed to re-allocate the salary cap in mid-March in an agreement with the NFL in which the league penalized the Redskins and the Cowboys, but "the union did not have any role in determining the penalties that were imposed," Kessler said on a conference call. "Had the union known about prior collusion, the union would never have agreed to these cap re-allocations," he said.
Kessler added that the union was "stunned" that NFL officials and spokespeople were talking about what he said was evidence of collusion in the press. Kessler said that the evidence the NFLPA has, prior to discovery, was far greater than what the MLBPA had when it pursued and won a collusion case against MLB club owners in the '80s. "The amount of evidence is extraordinary without any discovery," he said.
