On his way to Miami before the NFL Players Association's meeting there last week, Vikings defensive end Stephen Weatherly heard from players across the league's career spectrum, from those in their rookie deals to veterans in the later stages of their careers.
When Weatherly eventually decided to vote in favor of the NFL's offer for an 11-year collective bargaining agreement, though, the player he thought about the most was the next one who'd walk his path, from a seventh-round pick through the practice squad and into a consistent role on his team's defense.
"From my personal journey, how I got here, every part of my journey would have been impacted positively," said Weatherly, the Vikings' second alternate player representative in the NFLPA behind Kirk Cousins and Adam Thielen. "I would have gotten more for base salary, more for performance-based pay. I would have gotten more opportunity to touch the field, all for a 17th game. The next guy that comes through my footsteps will have every part of his journey more positively impacted than mine."
Weatherly said he expected the deal to pass by more than the 60-vote margin it did on Saturday, because so many players on the lower end of the league's pay scale would benefit from things such as $100,000 minimum-salary raises, expanded gameday rosters and practice squads and clubs' ability to send players from the active roster to the practice squad twice without exposing them to waivers.
Ultimately, 1,019 players approved the deal, outweighing the 959 who voted no over concerns about whether owners gave enough in exchange for a 17th regular-season game as soon as 2021 and momentum toward the owners' wish to add two more playoff teams starting this season. Weatherly heard from those who voted for economic stability after a week of coronavirus news dropped the stock market by more than 2,000 points. By a slim margin, players decided the deal in front of them was better than their negotiating prospects in the future.
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"If you were going to throw a 17th game in there — which no player wanted, voting yes or no — what are they willing to concede?" Weatherly said. "People who voted 'no' thought they did not make enough concessions, which is true. Everyone agrees with that. But then, they got to the point where they were able to appease just enough of us, clearly, with the narrow margin."
The 25-year-old, who will become a free agent at the start of the league year, is also among the players with a better chance of cashing in now that the league has 11 more years of guaranteed labor peace. The NFL set its 2020 salary cap at $198.2 million on Sunday, opting for a lower number than initial projections of $201 million, but with a CBA in place, teams will not have to operate under the "30 percent rule," which would have prevented them from backloading contracts into future years where the cap is expected to be higher because of new TV deals.
The new deal gives the Vikings more latitude with how they'd structure a new deal for Cousins, whose contract expires after 2020. The Vikings have shown interest in completing a deal before the start of the league year, when a contract that lowers the quarterback's $31 million cap number for 2020 would benefit them the most.
Especially after the Titans gave Ryan Tannehill a deal on Sunday that eclipses Cousins' contract with an average of $29 million a year, the Vikings would have to make a new deal worth the quarterback's while; the fully guaranteed deal he signed two years ago, and his career year in 2019, have bought Cousins leverage in negotiations. Even if those factors complicate the path to a new deal before free agency begins Wednesday, the Vikings would have more flexibility with how they eventually structure extensions for players such as Cousins or running back Dalvin Cook.
They cleared more than $19 million in cap room on Friday when they released cornerback Xavier Rhodes, nose tackle Linval Joseph and tight end David Morgan, though the Vikings approach the start of the free-agent negotiating window with the ninth-least available cap space in the league. Still, the new CBA means they, and other teams, have more room to manipulate their cap dollars how they see fit — "which is like a super-selfish thing for me as a free agent; it's super-personal," Weatherly said.
"[The 30 percent rule] is no longer in effect, so that helps me out," he said. "It also helps teams to do more maneuvering if they need more cap space, which allows them to go out and get more deals, pay good players, which resets the market for me. [Seattle pass rusher Jadeveon] Clowney goes higher; I get more money, that whole thing."
Did management win with a deal players didn't have to take?
The higher salary floor — and the potential to earn more through new TV deals next year — was ultimately enough for a small majority of players to table their concerns about adding a 17th game. Weatherly said many players at the NFLPA meetings in Miami thought owners should have done more to emphasize player safety, adding that the topic needs to remain at the forefront of players' concerns going forward.
But at a time when the U.S. economy appears to be tightening up, Weatherly and others on the lower end of the league salary spectrum chose to seize the chance at a pay bump. That decision could buy the Vikings the flexibility they need to construct their 2020 roster, and float a little more financial security toward players whose careers might be relatively short.
"It's not Christmas; it's a negotiation," Weatherly said. "People are out here fighting. This was going on for well over a year. I hope everyone takes that into consideration, because a lot of people think the men that were in these rooms, fighting against the owners, weren't trying their hardest to get what they wanted. They were. But it's a negotiation at the end of the day; there's give and take."