David Akers has been one of the players joining Michael Vick for informal team workouts in Marlton, and as one of the teams’ union reps, has been filling his teammates in on what’s going on in the ongoing dispute between the owners and players. He told CSNPhilly yesterday that he actually doesn’t think the owners and players are that far apart.
"To me, I don’t think we’re off that much ultimately, in that I think cooler heads need to prevail and sit down and kind of get out of the core system right now and just figure out the best scenario for the owners, the players and obviously the fans who support the entire league," Akers said. "So it’s discouraging right now to kind of be in this limbo not really knowing when the season’s going to start, if it’s going to start, you know, and everything that kind of goes along with it. So I would just hope that cooler heads ultimately prevail right now."
With all due respect to Akers, if the owners and players aren’t that far apart, someone should tell the union leadership. As late as last week, NFLPA Executive Director DeMaurice Smith was still branding the owners’ offer as “the worst deal in the history of professional sports.” That sounds pretty far off to me.