While NFL owners and players appear to be inching toward a resolution of the league's lengthy lockout, a group of retired players is clamoring to be more involved in the discussions.
The group on Monday filed a class-action complaint against the owners and current players in a Minneapolis federal court, saying they have been excluded from the mediation sessions taking place in an attempt to end the lockout.
Altogether 38 plaintiffs, including 24 former players, were listed on the complaint, which asks U.S. District Judge Susan Richard Nelson to put a halt to the mediation she ordered and declare that the current players cannot negotiate on behalf of those who are retired. Hall of Famers Franco Harris, Marcus Allen, Carl Eller, Mike Haynes, Ron Mix, Paul Krause, Lem Barney, Elvin Bethea and Joe DeLamielleure are included as plaintiffs.
DeLamielleure said Tuesday that his group should be part of the process, not excluded from it.
"The union is saying, (executive director) DeMaurice Smith is saying, 'We are one team.' Well, they gave us a seat but no chair," DeLamielleure said. "We really have no say-so. Guess what: Those two guys are negotiating, the league and the union, without us again."
Jeff Nixon, another of the plaintiffs, said the retired players are asking both parties to set aside an additional 3 percent (1.5 percent each) of league revenues for retired players.
The league and the current players had no comment on the retirees' complaint.
Owners and current players have met five times over the last few weeks as they work to put together a new collective bargaining agreement in time to avoid the loss of training camps and games. They met with U.S. Magistrate Judge Arthur J. Boylan in Minneapolis last week, including for more than 15 hours Thursday, and their legal teams resumed meetings Tuesday in New York.
The retired players said Monday in their complaint that NFL owners; the NFL Players Association and a group of current players, including star quarterbacks Tom Brady, Peyton Manning and Drew Brees, are "conspiring to depress the amounts of pension and disability benefits to be paid to former NFL players in order to maximize the salaries and benefits to current NFL players."
The complaint gets to the heart of an issue that has been building for quite some time. Retired players have felt marginalized in the dispute over how to divide more than $9 billion in revenue.
After the owners locked out the players in March, the NFLPA disbanded, and a group of them sued the league for antitrust violations. A small group of retired players, including Eller, Obafemi Ayanbadejo and Ryan Collins, filed their own lawsuit against the league seeking more help for medical treatments of former players and better pensions.
Nelson combined the two lawsuits, and several representatives of the retired players, including Eller and attorney Michael Hausfeld, were present at early mediation sessions in Minneapolis. But as talks have heated up and the venue has shifted from the Twin Cities to Maryland, Massachussetts, Illinois and back to Minneapolis again over the last month or so, the retired players haven't been present.
This hasn't sat well with them, and lawyers for the group have sent letters to Boylan, lobbied NFL Commissioner Roger Goodell and held intense media briefings to make their feelings known.
The complaint said the players' decision to decertify their union makes it an antitrust violation for the owners and current players to negotiate for retired players.
It also alleges that the NFL had said it would tap revenue streams both from within and outside the salary cap to help retired players, but union representatives, including Smith, want all the money delegated for the cap to be given to current players.
"Through the settlement they are forging, the Brady plaintiffs, the NFLPA and the NFL defendants are conspiring to set retiree benefits and pension levels at artificially low levels," the complaint alleged.
If Nelson rejects the motion for an injunction on the mediation, the retired players are asking for treble damages.
It wasn't immediately clear what kind of impact the filing would have on the continuing talks between owners and current players. The open of training camp is less than three weeks away, and the preseason opener between the Chicago Bears and St. Louis Rams is slated for Aug. 7 in Canton, Ohio.
The Associated Press contributed to this report.
