Despite seemingly everything else in the sports world shutting down amid coronavirus concerns, the NFL new league year will start this week as planned. The NFL sent a memo to teams informing them of the decision on Sunday.
Now official. NFL sent memo to teams, informing them: Negotiation window noon tomorrow. League year weds. Franchise designation ends tomorrow at noon. Official.
— Adam Schefter (@AdamSchefter) March 15, 2020
The franchise/transition tag deadline is Monday morning at 11:59:59 a.m. ET, and that’s followed by the free agency negotiating window opening at noon ET. The new league year begins with free agency officially opening at 4 p.m. ET on Wednesday (and all teams must be under the $198.2 million salary cap).
Despite inquiries from numerous clubs about a potential delay, the NFL says business will proceed as planned:
11:59:59 a.m. ET tomorrow: Franchise/transition tag deadline
Noon tomorrow: Negotiating window opens
4 p.m. Wednesday: New league year begins.
— Tom Pelissero (@TomPelissero) March 15, 2020
ESPN’s Adam Schefter reports that the NFLPA “would not provide consent to move (the) league year.” The reasoning is that there’s no traveling necessary, everyone is working remotely, and the pandemic could get worse before it gets better.
NFL says NFLPA would not provide consent to move league year, per source.
NFLPA says: No one is traveling anyway. It’s not football activity, it’s deals. Everyone is working remotely. Let’s do our business remotely. And this could get worse before it gets better. So do it now.
— Adam Schefter (@AdamSchefter) March 15, 2020
So, there’s actually something in sports to talk about (aside from league cancellations etc, of course), and this is especially a big thing for sports media outlets. No sports leagues in action makes covering sports quite difficult!
While this will definitely be a content boost for print journalism and online outlets, this only matters for TV outlets if they continue their in-studio operation. FS1 suspended production on their studio shows, and ESPN suspended production on PTI and their early-morning SportsCenter.
But if ESPN and NFL Network choose to continue with much live programming, the NFL offseason action should be able to provide plenty of needed content.
Update: ESPN continues its heavy coverage of NFL free agency coverage Wednesday.
ESPN has 5 hours of NFL Live and SportsCenter specials focused on the first official day of NFL Free Agency today. Our programming update for Wed: pic.twitter.com/zBTrFE25Ic
— bill hofheimer (@bhofheimer_espn) March 18, 2020
