NFLPA Reminds Players They Can Always Sell Their Pants If There's a Work Stoppage

The NFL Players Association is doing due diligence before a potential work stoppage and has therefore assembled a digital document with tips for players to manage finances should the work dry up. Pro Football Talk’s Mike Florio saw the guide and offered a book report.

"The “Work Stoppage Guide,” a copy of which PFT has obtained, includes specific advice on how to being saving money, in the event that the plug gets pulled after the 2020 season. The guide includes an “ABC” approach — adjust, budget, cut — that recommends cooking at home instead of eating out, cancelling unused subscriptions, adopting a weekly “no spending day,” reviewing investments, implementing a “friends and family policy” regarding money given to those who commonly ask for some of it, avoiding the co-signing of loans, making arrangements for child support and/or alimony to allow temporarily reduced payments during a work stoppage, renting unoccupied homes or bedrooms to offset mortgage expenses, saving at least half of each game check, making any essential home repairs now, renting instead of buying a home, delaying the purchasing of any cars until after the CBA is signed, selling any car that hasn’t been driven in six months, reducing clothing purchases, selling clothes that haven’t been worn in over a year, getting a line of credit in place now for use if necessary during a work stoppage, and more."

This is all basic advice which may or may not be put into practice depending on how labor negotiations go over the next eight months. The guide reads as though a stoppage would be a result of a lockout, not a players’ strike, so there’s no need to get overly concerned about that future possibility yet.

It’s all probably nothing. The thing that stands out — and almost makes a person want to root for an NFL stalemate — is the possibility that an influx of sweet, offday-worn big and tall clothing could be hitting the market. Who among us wouldn’t want a pair of Aaron Donald’s pants? Or Cam Newton’s Zubaz? Or Justin Tucker’s — I have to assume — golf polo?

Can you imagine how much fun it’d be to sit home and feverishly bid on these priceless artifacts? It’s best to not even think about at this point.

In all seriousness, though, the overlap in the size department between people in the NFL and those who aren’t in the NFL seems small. Definitely just a minor part of an overall plan.