The specter of an NFL Lockout still hangs over the 2011 football season, but the NFLPA and the NFL owners negotiated their second extension today, pushing the expiration of the current CBA—the de facto deadline—ahead an extra week, to next Friday. As Roger Goodell said in a press conference following the announcement, “Talking is better than litigating,” and we now have an extra week of talking to look forward to.
Yesterday’s extension was an emergency action, designed only to keep the two sides talking while they attempted to continue negotiations. This one means negotiations might be going someplace. The chances of a full NFL season in 2011 are suddenly looking better than they have in some time, although questions still remain as to how any compromise would look.
As discussed on SB Nation, the two sides had previously reached such an impasse that an extension was the only possible good news that could come out of this last week of talks. So far, so good—and no NFL Lockout.