The flipside of this is that the system the NFL has in place helps creates parity (non-guaranteed contracts are a part of that). Parity has helped make the NFL so popular, and that in turn makes it the revenue king. Since the players get a portion of revenues, they benefit from the overall success of the league. Basically, the NFLPA seems to lose the short-term battles but is winning the war.
NFLPA hopeful Sean Gilbert proposes $1M minimum salary, 18 games, other changes http://sports.yahoo.com/blogs/nfl-s...alary--18-games--other-changes-154229229.html
1. MLB has just as much parity, if not more than the NFL, while having guaranteed contracts. 2. The NFL's popularity exceed MLB's popularity, decades ago, even before the 1993 salary cap. 3. MLB teams aren't exactly in the poor house and are as valuable as NFL franchises. http://www.forbes.com/mlb-valuations/list/
MLB also has 10 times as many games as the NFL, so of course total revenues will be higher. That's 10 times as much potential gate receipts and 10 times as much TV content. That said, I don't think MLB has as much parity as the NFL, though it's hard to find a good measure due to the different playoff structures. There is definitely more parity once you make the playoffs, simply because luck plays a much larger part in any given MLB game or series. But I think there is less parity in terms of overall success. I think it takes longer to build a good MLB team than it does a good NFL one, and it's easier to sustain one in MLB once you have a good one.
http://espn.go.com/blog/jayson-stark/post/_/id/11/mlb-greater-parity-nfl Mediocre League Baseball: Extreme parity a result of Selig's plan http://www.si.com/mlb/2014/06/17/mediocre-teams
I'm not sure how this disagrees with anything I said. He's comparing SB Winners - I already said there's more luck involved in baseball once you make the postseason, so there will be more variety of winners there. Outside of a one season sample size, he doesn't look at playoff teams at all. For the second article, I'm not sure what methodology he's using, but anything that says the NBA, of all leagues, has more parity than the NFL is ridiculous. The NBA is the ulltimate example of a league without parity, though it has increased with the latest CBA.
I think it's also dangerous to just look at results (# of playoff teams, etc) because the sports are all so different, so it's not necessarily the specific rules that are creating parity or not. But going back to the original question of why the NFL Union is so weak, I still don't think they are. NFL players have done extremely well for themselves and, by working with the NFL, have become the dominant sport in the country. Could they have done better and gotten a bigger share? Maybe - but it's hard to argue that they haven't done really well for themselves.
A commenter on the ESPN article linked to this post for a different take on parity: http://ijustsported.com/2014/01/20/baseball-is-the-least-competitive-of-u-s-sports/
No arbitration (challenging player discipline policy - very unfair, as well as salary disputes); no guaranteed salaries; no trade clause/subject to unchallenged release; are often expdcted to take a paycut; uncontested, limitless franchises; and what did the players gain of significance from the last NFL lockout. It's a weak union, compared to MLB and NFL.
