The Player’s Union Report Cards
Last week the NFL Players Union did something they hadn’t done before: report cards for each team. They sent out a questionnaire to as many players as possible and asked for their opinions and information about their 2022 season employer. The intention seems to be to identify which clubs treat people well and which teams have issues. This will allow the players to have more information at their disposal when making decisions for themselves and will also hopefully result in some action by the teams who are shamed by the report cards. This was a great idea on their part and I fully support it.
It wasn’t a perfect system, from the looks of it. For example, one of the questions seemed to be if players were given adequate personal space. That’s a difficult question to get a consensus on from person to person. Someone with a fair amount of room might still say no, while someone less bothered and with less space might say yes. This also only pertains to players experiences specifically (It is made by the NFLPA), not any other employee of the organization, such as cooks or janitors or maintenance men, etc. Although you can probably extrapolate that most grades would probably be in line with what the players answered so if a team was cheap to players, they are probably cheap to everyone else as well.
One thing I really appreciated about this was how it gave an insight into the daily, regular aspects of the NFL as a job. We really only see players on the field every Sunday. We tend to think of them as their celebrity status as they perform on the stage. We aren’t seeing the travel downtime, the locker room facilities, the offices, the film rooms, or the cafeteria. I never even considered daycare and family support as important factors for a team, but it absolutely is.
That said, I think the report cards mostly followed in line with what we should have expected. Jerry Jones might be an evil oil goblin, but there’s no doubt he takes pride in his team and I’m not surprised the Cowboys are ranked highly overall. Similarly, the Giants (8th), are another “prestige franchise” so seeing them in the top ten with quality facilities and effective care from an owner who doesn’t really do anything else but own a football team makes sense. The Miami Dolphins, ranked #2, seemed high but Ross is willing to spend the money to try and tamper for Tom Brady and Miami is a town known for showing off. The Raiders ranking so high seemed to surprise people, but they are ranking the 2022 Las Vegas Raiders, not the likely abysmal Oakland Raiders. Mark Davis gave his new team all the best stuff in the recent move, and it might be time we stop considering the Raiders as a “cheap” franchise. The Vikings were another case. They recently upgraded everything too, and it would appear they did a stupendous job, being the best-ranked team out of all. The Texans at #4 were maybe the biggest positive surprise considering the turmoil that team has been in for years.
The bottom of the list however contained more surprises. The Bengals and Commanders at 27 and 32 respectively, were not surprising. We’ve known Mike Brown is an old cheap turd for a long time. I think literally everyone could have accurately predicted the Commanders in last place. Same with the Chargers (30) or the Cardinals (31) being so low. Although the report card caused some drama in Cardinals circles because it revealed the team makes the players pay for their own food at the facility. They also apparently have an abysmal, unsafe gym.
The Chiefs at 29 was a surprise, at first, but it makes sense when you stop looking at it from an on-field success perspective and look at it from an ownership perspective. The Chiefs aren’t a very wealthy franchise either and they haven’t upgraded anything in a long time. What did continue to surprise me, however, was the Jaguars (28) and Rams (25). The Jaguars are not a wealthy franchise, but Khan didn’t seem like a cheap owner, just a dumb one. I didn’t expect him to be the one with a rat problem. The Rams? The Rams, like the Raiders, just moved to a wealthier position. Unlike the Chargers, I expected better out of them. They were disappointing across the board.
The one other thing of note that a lot of people noticed: pretty much every team gave their strength coaching staff a high grade…except the Falcons (D-) and Ravens (F-). The Ravens notably fired their strength coach before the report came out, and not a small number of people suspected they may have done so to get ahead of this.
There are plenty of little individual tidbits in there worth scouring for, like the dig at Josh McDaniels not listening to players and keeping them late. Were you surprised by your team’s ranking?
Yes, I saw the Daniel Jones news, I’ll get to it, don’t @ me yet.
Loved the Texans’ card. Only real detraction was them not having a sauna, and their travel policy was singled out for praise for how much it treated the players like adults. Glad to see that for all the drama the Church Goblin caused, the McNairs do still treat their players right.
Firing football terrorist Steve Saunders was the right move, but based on what players current and former have said the Ravens’ whole damn strength and training staff needs to be overhauled. If they aren’t mature enough to get over their personal differences and do their fucking jobs at the direct cost of the athletes they’re supposed to be taking care of, that goes further than just the guy in charge.
Not rats, emotional support mice: https://twitter.com/jamalagnew/status/1633142527057444880
FWIW they also had the players rank all of the owners! It’s by “willingness to spend”, but I think it’s really a “how much do you respect this guy” question. Khan actually got a high rating despite the Jags poor overall rating (seemingly 100% because of rats). The real upset though was the Dan Snyder was the 31st ranked owner!!! Somehow the Cardinals guy was seen as more miserly/bad than him! Hail to the Commanders!!!
Chiefs head trainer was singled out, wonder if there will be consequences.
Chargers already fired their head trainer due to negative reviews.
I was a little surprised at the Saints nutrition score, but who would eat dinner at the facility anyway when you could be eating around New Orleans instead.
I agree with most of their listings/reasons the PA lists, though complaining about the lack of first class seats is the most petty thing I’ve heard of out of a football player.
I think it’s fair to mention. The point of these reports is to let players know what teams offer the best conditions. Knowing that a team offers first class is relevant. I’m interested to know how it is weighted as far as score as I agree it feels less important
I disagree, because the qualifier they had with those is usually “…while the coaching staff got first class,”. If you’re making your players fly cross-country in the equivalent of coach (since let’s be honest, the vast majority of NFL players are much bigger than the average person and they’re not going to be that comfortable in coach even if they leave the middle seat open on every row) while the coordinators get the roomy comfy seats, it does give an indicator how they rank the players in their internal hierarchy. These men are the entire reason the team makes money, and with the team worth billions as it is, players considering taking a contract with them should be able to know if they can’t be assed to spend the extra cash for their benefit for an all-first class charter with all the other money in play.
where is the steelers
22 out of 32 — not great, but not the worst. The Steelers got some REALLY, really bad grades for facilities — family support, training room, and locker room all had D+ or D- grades. The team also has very, very low confidence that Art Rooney is actually going to spend to improve said facilities, tied with the Mike Brown Bengals and only ahead of the Bidwells and Dan Snyder.
I have no idea why the Patriots ranked so low. If anyone has an inkling please tell me.
It seems like Kraft is just cheap. Poor facilities and no daycare provided. They are one of eleven to not do that. Maybe something to do with a history of being able to be cheap when it comes to players.
My favorite thing about this is snyder having four detention slips on the chalkboard. I hate this team sometimes.
The Eagles’ main problems seem to be training room space (not quality) and day care during games and practice. (Apparently, the coaches have it, but the players don’t? Really?) Knowing Jeff Lurie, who tends to be very close with several of the team leaders, he’s probably already trying to fix those issues as best as possible. The problem is that the stadium (which, I will say, the Eagles helped design in the first place) apparently has all sorts of bizarre issues with how spaces are laid out internally, and so it isn’t straight-forward to simply expand the training room or whatever. (Don’t take this as gospel, as I’ve only heard this from others who have been inside.)
They already had to do a major renovation not even 10 years after it opened, partially because they needed to fix the upper deck stands, which were built without any connection to the rest of the stadium outside of an escalator. So it wouldn’t surprise me if the Linc is going to need another large construction project soon.
At least it ain’t the Vet.
I can’t tell if I’m surprised or if it’s obvious that Seattle doesn’t fly first-class when they fly more than anybody.
I’m confused though, I thought these teams fly their own planes or at least charters. When they say “no first class”, … that can’t possibly mean that the Seahawks fly coach on a common carrier, can it? I can’t even imagine 53 roster players and training staff on the same Delta MD-11 flying to Vegas with a bunch of tourists/vacationers.
It’s probably charter as they don’t fly enough to have their own plane. So it comes down to the type and layout of plane chartered. The Seahwaks must use one that’s layed out like a regular commercial airliner rather than a business jet. Makes sense as its cheaper, but I imagine for a lineman you want them to feel as good as possible after a flight and not tight & tense.
I love this idea because it rightfully shifts things onto owners. Often times when players hold out for money we end up taking the owner’s/teams side and saying how selfish the player is, but these reports are really damning and will get people going “Why don’t all the players fly first class? Why do some have to pay for lunch??? Why aren’t these amenities standard across the league?” I’m all for this.
I’m glad there’s at least hope for future mechanisms like this to try to shame bad owners. Clearly they have no shame because they’re outrageously wealthy and don’t live in the same reality we do, but at least it’s a start.
F- is a stupid, meaningless grade. It’s either failure or it’s not. If there’s a special grade for abject failure, I nominate “Snyder.”
Reasonably happy with the Bills’ score. As someone who used to travel a ton for work, I have to laugh at the travel grades across the board, though.
Subliminal advertising? I’m craving Old Bay chicken wings right now….
Broncos facilities good, services bad, ranked overall at the lower end of the league. Not too surprising from the Walmarts.