Pittsburgh Steelers owner Art Rooney II has taken a lot of heat when the NFLPA’s annual report cards are released. Ones that often give him bad grades and rank him as one of the worst owners in sports. Now, the owners are fighting back. Per ESPN’s Seth Wickersham and Don Van Natta Jr., the NFL is trying to put the kibosh on the report cards.
“The league claims the report cards, which poll players on various aspects of working conditions, violate a CBA clause that says NFL owners and the union must ‘use reasonable efforts to curtail public comments by club personnel or players which express criticism of any club, its coach, or its operation and policy,’ according to an August letter from the league’s management council to NFLPA general counsel Tom DePaso, obtained by ESPN.