J.C. Tretter To Resign From NFLPA
Instead of being a candidate to replace Lloyd Howell as the NFLPA’s executive director, J.C. Tretter will instead step aside from the union. The former NFLPA president said in an interview with CBS Sports’ Jonathan Jones he will resign. 
“Over the last couple days, it has gotten very, very hard for my family. And that’s something I can’t deal with,” Tretter said. “So, the short bullet points are: I have no interest in being [executive director]. I have no interest in being considered; I’ve let the executive committee know that. I’m also going to leave the NFLPA in the coming days because I don’t have anything left to give the organization.”
Howell received backing from the NFLPA before, days later, deciding to step down. Tretter – who was a key figure in the Howell hire and the union’s actions during his tenure at the helm – has also emerged as the source of backlash with a number of revelations being made about his conduct. Currently the union’s chief strategy officer, Tretter was among the names listed as potential Howell replacements on an interim basis. Shortly after a meeting of player reps and the executive committee, however, things have changed.
“I love the guys [in the union], and that’s why I’ve done what I’ve done for the last six years is because I love what they do and who they are and the mission of the organization,” the 34-year-old added, noting he did not conceive a ploy to usurp Howell as the executive director. “And I think what I realized this morning when I woke up… is that I fell in love with the idea of what this place could be. And over the last six weeks, I’ve realized what this place is, and the delta between those two things.”
Tretter’s interview contains details about the process by which Howell was hired in 2023. A shift to a more streamlined vetting and interview process resulted in a hire shrouded in secrecy compared to previous ones. Tretter also noted the NFLPA’s executive voted 10-1 against Howell (with his vote being one of the 10) in a straw poll but decided not to mention it to the union’s general membership. Brought in with the hopes of leading the way through CBA talks, Howell’s tenure came to an abrupt end after revelations about his role in keeping collusion grievance findings hidden as well as conflict of interest concerns. Tretter’s connections to Howell (and thus the scandals) made him a target for scrutiny over the past few days.
Tretter expressed regret during the interview about his remarks made about Broncos quarterback Russell Wilson with respect his lack of a fully guaranteed contract. The former NFL center also offered an apology for his comments suggesting running backs could feign injury as a negotiating tactic. That spurred a grievance against the NFLPA which the league won and which resulted in the union firing the arbitrator involved in the case.
In a sign of the growing consternation over his presence in the organization, Tretter added he feels many of the “attacks” he has received in recent weeks have come from within the NFLPA. With the union seeking a new leader, Tretter will not take part in the search process nor will he stay on in any capacity.
J.C. Tretter, Don Davis Are Frontrunners For Interim NFLPA Exec. Director
July 20: Many training camps around the league open on Tuesday, and the NFLPA is expected to vote on an interim executive director by then, per ESPN’s Adam Schefter.
July 19: The NFLPA is continuing to navigate the fallout of a series of revelations about executive director Lloyd Howell and his subsequent resignation.
The union’s 32 player representatives met on Friday night to discuss the next steps regarding Howell’s now-vacant position. Two current NFLPA leaders emerged as frontrunners, according to The Athletic’s Diana Russini: Chief Strategy Officer J.C. Tretter and Chief Player Officer Don Davis. Also gaining some support among players is retiring NFLPA general counsel Tom DePaso, per Mark Maske of The Washington Post.
Tretter and Davis are both former players, which will help them gain credibility among the union’s active membership. Tretter lined up at center for the Packers and the Browns across eight NFL seasons, while Davis played linebacker for four teams across 11 years and earned two back-to-back Super Bowl rings with the Patriots in 2003 and 2004.
Tretter also has experience leading the union after serving as NFLPA president for two terms. He was elected in March 2020 and helped close out collective bargaining negotiations with the league. One month later, the NFL was facing an uncertain future due to the coronavirus pandemic. Tretter became the co-chair of the NFLPA’s COVID committee and helped the union navigate the 2020 season. It was widely considered a success with a full 256-game schedule and minimal, contained outbreaks. Tretter then won re-election in 2022, but his second term could be a vulnerability due to his involvement with several major issues facing the union. Two of those issues – hiring Howell in 2023 and suppressing two arbitration rulings – were part of Tretter’s effort to ascend to the top of the union’s leadership structure, according to Pablo Torre of Pablo Finds Out.
The 34-year-old currently has a “majority of support,” per Russini, but there is a growing movement among players to move on from Tretter’s leadership along with Howell. Some are even exploring legal action against the NFLPA and Tretter specifically, “citing potential violations around inclusion, labor rights, and misuse of union funds,” according to Russini. A text criticizing Tretter’s leadership circulated between players during last night’s meeting, per Ben Volin of the Boston Globe.
Davis, who has overseen player affairs at the NFLPA for more than a decade, is Tretter’s main competition for the interim executive director role. He is considered the “No. 1 internal candidate,” per CBS Sports Jonathan Jones, and is already receiving support from players, according to both Russini and Maske. (Colts wide receiver Michael Pittman Jr. has already expressed his support for Davis on social media.)
After he retired from playing in 2006, Davis joined the Patriots’ strength and conditioning staff and later became the team chaplain. He joined the NFLPA as director of player affairs in 2010, according to his LinkedIn, and was promoted to senior director in 2015 and Chief Player Officer this past April. Davis could also be a candidate for the permanent executive director job, per Jones.
DePaso, the union’s retiring general counsel who briefly played for the Bengals, is another name that has been mentioned by players as a candidate. There is also precedent for the union’s general counsel to serve as interim executive director. The last time the NFLPA needed an interim executive director was 2008, when Gene Upshaw died in office. Then-general counsel Richard Berthelsen served as Upshaw’s interim replacement until DeMaurice Smith was hired, according to Mike Florio of Pro Football Talk.
Howell was just hired in 2023 and past executive directors have typically served more than a decade, so the union was not prepared to start another search process right away. Finalists in the last process are unlikely to re-emerge, according to Jones, as players will be seeking a leader they can trust. The union will be looking for experience, either within the NFL as a player or with labor management more generally. The NFLPA currently has no timetable for selecting a permanent executive director, per Russini, and whoever is tapped as the interim is not expected to be promoted to the full-time role.
It’s also worth noting that many players are not fully up to date on the multitude of issues now facing the NFLPA. Much of last night’s meeting was about answering questions and clarifying information, according to Russini. Awareness will continue to spread around the league, especially as teams reunite for training camp. The union’s next priority will be selecting an interim leader before kicking off what will likely be a revamped, more thorough search process for a permanent executive director.
NFL Won Grievance Over NFLPA On J.C. Tretter’s RB Injury Remarks
Much has been made recently about the collusion grievance filed by the NFLPA against the NFL and the fallout from an arbitrator’s findings on the case being made public. Another case between the two has likewise recently come to light.
Former Packers and Browns center J.C. Tretter – who served as NFLPA president before occupying his current role as chief strategy officer for the union – spoke two years ago about the state of the running back market. Given the flat financial growth seen at the position at that point, Tretter openly remarked about the possibility of players fabricating and/or exaggerating injuries to help their negotiating position. The NFL filed a grievance over the matter; the details of the case were revealed during the latest collaboration between Pablo Torre of the Pablo Finds Out podcast and Pro Football Talk’s Mike Florio (video link).
The NFLPA offered a statement to Florio noting how no evidence was found that running backs (or other players) faked an injury. A number of high-profile running backs met virtually to discuss their options regarding leverage in contract negotiations in the wake of Tretter’s remarks. Despite that fact no action was taken in terms of false claims related to injuries, the league ended up winning the grievance since Tretter violated the CBA with his comments.
“The Arbitrator upheld the Management Council’s grievance in its entirety and found that Mr. Tretter’s statements violated the CBA by improperly encouraging players to fake injury,” a league statement supplied to Florio reads in part. “As a result, he prohibited Mr. Tretter and the union from such conduct in the future. The NFL did not allege that any individual player ever feigned injury.”
As was the case in the collusion grievance, nothing from the February 2025 ruling was made public by either side. While a subsequent statement from the league says (via Florio) teams were informed of the grievance during the spring, a general manager contacted by Florio about the matter was met with a puzzled response. The lack of public knowledge on the Tretter case came about in the wake of the joint decision by the league and union to keep the collusion findings secret for several months.
In more recent news, Sidney Moreland – the arbitrator overseeing non-injury grievance cases, including the Tretter one – has been fired by the NFLPA. The move (first reported by Sportico’s Michael McCann and Eben Novy-Williams) is permitted by the CBA, which allows the league or union to dismiss arbitrators since they are jointly appointed. Per the report, the decision to fire Moreland was not related to the recent revelations about the Tretter case.
Nevertheless, this latest news adds further to the attention the NFLPA has received recently. The union will no doubt remain in the spotlight as its search for a new executive director unfolds in the wake of Lloyd Howell‘s resignation. Tretter is still in place as a key figure in the organization, although it remains to be seen at this point if he will emerge as a candidate to replace Howell.
NFLPA Board Of Player Reps To Meet After Latest Lloyd Howell Revelations
The NFLPA’s board of player representatives is meeting tonight after the resignation of executive director Lloyd Howell amid multiple controversies, according to Mark Maske of The Washington Post.
All 32 teams have one player representative and three alternates who are selected by their teammates every other year. They are likely to be joined by the NFLPA’s player-led executive committee as well as other union executives.
Howell has come under scrutiny in recent weeks due to his handling of the union’s collusion grievance against the NFL, a potential conflict of interest from his consultant gig at a private equity firm, and a revelations about sexual discrimination and retaliation lawsuit during his time at Booz Allen Hamilton.
Howell’s resignation was also triggered by questions about his use of union funds, according to ESPN’s Don Van Natta Jr. and Kalyn Kahler. An outside investigator reportedly found that Howell submitted expense reports for transportation and cash withdrawals at strip clubs, including $2,426 in charges during this year’s NFLPA summit in Atlanta in February, per ESPN’s Adam Schefter. Howell was accompanied by two union employees and submitted the outing as a “Player Engagement Event to support & grow our Union.”
Howell faced similar accusations of misused company funds while working for Booz Allen in 2015, per Van Natta and Kahler.. A colleague submitted an expense report for a strip club visit – while he was still a defendant in the aforementioned lawsuit, which was later settled.
The FBI has also been investigating the NFLPA (as well as the MLBPA) due to their dealings with OneTeam Partners, a multibillion-dollar group-licensing firm, as originally reported by Van Natta and his ESPN colleague, Jeff Passan. That led to an ongoing internal union investigation into Howell’s leadership, led by attorney Ronald C. Machen of Wilmer Hale, according to Van Natta and Kahler.
NFLPA To Appeal Collusion Ruling
In January, arbitrator Christopher Droney issued a ruling on the NFLPA’s collusion case filed against the NFL. Details of that decision were revealed two weeks ago after both parties agreed to suppress the findings.
The league and union struck a confidentiality agreement in an attempt to keep Droney’s ruling secret, ESPN’s Don Van Natta Jr. and Kayln Kahler report. Things changed when an investigation from Pablo Torre Finds Out published a 61-page document detailing a portion of Droney’s findings. In the wake of the collusion case’s outcome becoming public knowledge, some players have expressed surprise at the union’s role in agreeing to bury it.
This situation has now taken another interesting turn. NFLPA executive director Lloyd Howell decided last night to appeal the ruling – which stated the NFL did not engage in collusion but also that teams were “urged” to restrict guarantees in player contracts – per the ESPN report. The CBA dictates appeals be made within 10 days of a ruling such as this being made, but one of the terms of the confidentiality agreement was that the Players Association would be able to file an appeal well after that period.
“The appeal is a reflection of our obligation to enforce the CBA and our commitment to protecting our players’ interests,” a senior NFLPA source told ESPN about the appeal decision. “We’ll do what’s best for players and we’ll exhaust our options in doing so.”
In the aftermath of the Droney ruling being published, it was reported players would consider their legal options. It was unclear if that would include civil suits being filed against the league based on the details of the case or against the union for its decision to keep the findings away from its members. As the ESPN report notes, DeMaurice Smith‘s tenure as NFLPA executive director regularly included the sharing of key information with the union’s executive committee and its 32 player representatives.
Howell conducted a conference call with the executive committee (which includes 10 members along with president Jalen Reeves-Maybin) shortly after the ruling was made, per the ESPN report. He passed along the outcome of the case but did not mention specifics or distribute copies of the findings from Droney, who was aware of the confidentiality agreement. Per the CBA, executive committee members and player reps have the right to obtain copies of all arbitration findings, but this unusual set of circumstances resulted in that not taking place in this case.
The grounds on which the pending appeal will be made are unclear at this point. The case – which began during Smith’s tenure and which Howell lamented for its usage of union resources once it ended – was founded on the fact Deshaun Watson‘s fully guaranteed Browns pact did not serve as a new precedent for QB deals. Specifically, Russell Wilson (Broncos), Kyler Murray (Cardinals) and Lamar Jackson (Ravens) were cited as examples of other NFL teams agreeing to avoid guaranteeing mega-extensions in full. Wilson and Jackson are known to have sought deals featuring fully locked in salaries, while Murray was the subject of communication between the Cardinals and Chargers’ owners before Justin Herbert inked his own extension.
The ESPN report adds that Howell’s leadership is currently under scrutiny. A special committee of players and an attorney hired last month are in the process of reviewing Howell’s tenure at the helm of the union. Executive committee member Cameron Heyward declined to comment on the appeal news but described the current NFLPA situation as “dicey.”
No timeline is in place at this point regarding when an appeal will be heard. In any case, further updates to this situation can be expected as the fallout from not only the ruling but the efforts to keep it hidden from players continues.
No Formal Discussions Imminent Regarding 18-Game Schedule
It has long been viewed as an inevitability that the NFL will expand to an 18-game regular season. An adjustment to the CBA will be required for that to be possible, and as such an agreement involving the NFL and NFLPA will need to be negotiated. 
Informal talks on the subject of reducing the preseason to two games and adding an 18th regular season contest have taken place between the league and union already. In part due to those discussions, some have pointed to 2027 or 2028 as the point at which an expanded schedule could be implemented. The current CBA runs through 2030, but new media rights deals – and thus the main source of another pending surge in revenues – will be in place by then.
Commissioner Roger Goodell said this spring that no formal discussions are planned about CBA adjustments or extensions. To little surprise, then, Mark Maske of the Washington Post reports no serious talks related to the schedule are expected to commence until at least early 2026. Any concession on the part of the union would of course be tied to negotiations on other fronts. Topics such as travel, playing surfaces and the addition of a second bye week have been mentioned as key issues for the NFLPA.
Maske names the period after the 2026 league meeting as a point at which negotiations could pick up. In any case, the nature of talks on this front will make for a notable storyline as efforts on the league’s part continue to expand the regular season schedule. Per Maske, Goodell has not yet “pressed” the union to accelerate discussions, although the NFL’s goals regarding a broader international schedule in particular are of course well known.
Adding an 18th game would likely pave the way for a slate of 16 international contests each regular season. Other matters will no doubt be tied to movement on this front, so a number of key CBA-related issues will be affected if/when an agreement can be reached between the league and union. The timeline for such talks is currently uncertain, though.
NFL Contract Notes: OL Award, Olympics, Rookie Bonuses, Collusion
MAY 24: Protector of the Year will be determined by a prestigious panel of former NFL offensive linemen based on the following five criteria (via Ben Volin of the Boston Globe): “skills, metrics, impact, leadership, ability, and strength of the opponents.”
Whitworth, who helped developed the award, will be on the panel. It also includes Orlando Pace and Will Shields, who are already in the Hall of Fame, and Jason Kelce, who is all but certain to join them once he’s eligible. The last two members, LeCharles Bentley and Shaun O’Hara, are less legendary offensive linemen, but both earned at least two Pro Bowls in their career and have remained connected with the league since their retirement.
MAY 23: The NFL is creating a new end-of-year award for offensive linemen called Protector of the Year, according to ESPN’s Brooke Pryor. Troy Vincent, the league’s executive vice president of football operations, said that current Bills left tackle Dion Dawkins and former Rams and Bengals left tackle Andrew Whitworth were key advocates for establishing the new honor.
Protector of the Year will be a welcome addition to the NFL’s annual awards season, which has largely focused on quarterbacks for Most Valuable Player and skill positions for Offensive and Defensive Players of the Year. Offensive linemen typically have to settle for for Pro Bowl or All-Pro nods, as they almost never contend for the main awards slate despite their impact on the field.
It’s unclear if Protector of the Year will have any more value for its recipients than league-wide recognition. The NFL’s collective bargaining agreement only allows specific awards to be used as player incentives in contracts, as noted by OverTheCap’s Nick Korte. The new award is not listed in the current CBA and could only be added if the NFLPA agrees.
Here is the latest news pertaining to contracts from around the league:
- The NFLPA will also have to navigate player participation in flag football at the 2028 Olympics, which owners unanimously approved earlier this week. “We look forward to working with the league, IFAF, and Olympic authorities on the terms of their participation to ensure players who compete will do so with protections to their health, safety, and job,” said NFLPA executive director Lloyd Howell in a statement (via Pro Football Talk’s Mike Florio). Those protections will be central to negotiations between the league and its players, who want to play in the Olympics without losing the financial security of their contracts.
- NFL rookies are receiving significantly larger signing bonuses in 2025 compared to previous years, according to CBS Sports’ Joel Corry. For example, No. 3 pick Abdul Carter received a $29.5MM signing bonus from the Giants, more than Caleb Williams got from the Bears as the first overall pick last year. Fourth and fifth overall picks Will Campbell and Mason Graham are also expected to surpass Williams’ signing bonus when they put pen to paper on their first pro contracts. The league’s undrafted rookie reservation – each team’s pool of signing bonus money for UDFAs – went up to $206K this year, a more-than 25% increase from 2024, per Corry. Teams have rarely used up all of their UDFA bonus money, instead preferring to guarantee base salary with offsets if a player is waived and signed by another team, according to OverTheCap’s Jason Fitzgerald.
- The NFLPA’s collusion grievance against the NFL regarding fully-guaranteed contracts for quarterbacks has been resolved, according to Florio. An arbitrator found that the league “encouraged teams not to do guaranteed contracts,” but that did not result in a significant impact on players – namely, Lamar Jackson, Russell Wilson, and Kyler Murray. In short, the ruling indicates that the NFL did engage in collusion to avoid fully-guaranteed contracts, but those efforts did not hurt players enough to trigger damages.
NFLPA Pushes Back On Prospect Of 18-Game Season
As expected, Roger Goodell‘s comments about an 18-game regular season have already drawn pushback from the NFL Players Association.
“The length of the season is a CBA negotiated matter, so any commentary outside of negotiation is just commentary,” said NFLPA executive director Lloyd Howell (via The Athletic’s Mike Jones). “No one wants to play an 18th game. No one. 17 games to many of the guys is still too long.”
That sentiment was echoed by NFLPA president Jalen Reeves-Maybin (via Mark Maske of The Pat McAfee Show):“I don’t think anyone was really in favor of going to 17 [games].”
Howell confirmed that neither the league nor the NFLPA have addressed the 18-game proposal in negotiations, per Maske. If and when formal talks begin, the players will have to consider several factors, including economic benefits, bye weeks, international travel, and roster size, before agreeing to another schedule expansion, according to Jones
Their fundamental objection will be the increased physical and mental burden of lengthening the already-grueling regular season. Despite Goodell’s promotion of the NFL’s healthy and safety measures, Howell argued that the league has not made enough progress in that arena to warrant an 18th game, per Jones.
However, the NFL seems determined to press on in its quest for an 18-game season, setting it up as a crucial issue for the 2030 CBA. Though, this issue is likely to be headed for true negotiations before that point. This will allow the NFLPA to seek important concessions in exchange for greenlighting a second schedule change in a decade.
NFLPA Director Lloyd Howell Addresses Potential Expansion To 18-Game Schedule
NFL commissioner Roger Goodell has publicly spoken on the subject of expanding the NFL’s regular season in recent months, bringing discussion of an 18-game schedule to the forefront. NFLPA director Lloyd Howell has been on the job for one year now, and he is open to discussing the matter well before the current CBA expires. 
As things stand, an 18-game schedule could be implemented no earlier than the 2031 season. Significant support exists amongst the league’s owners to arrange for one preseason contest to be replaced by a regular season one well before that point, however. Knowing concessions will need to be made to the player’s union for such a move to be possible, Howell is open to negotiations taking place now to avoid any work stoppages.
“I’m glad Roger said 18. I’m glad that he’s leaning into international [games],” Howell said, via The Athletic’s Mike Jones (subscription required). “I think it gives our guys the opportunity to kind of get their thoughts together, get our position together, to say, ‘This is what and how we’re thinking about it.’
“It makes no economic sense for anyone to have a strike or a lockout. The world’s most popular sports league is going well. How do we keep that going? A lockout is an irrational thing. What’s more rational is, ‘Hey, if I could grow this two times, if I could grow this three times, then we should figure out what the agreements would need to be.’”
A number of issues will need to be addressed for traction to be gained on negotiations between owners and the NFLPA regarding an 18-game arrangement. Howell noted the handling of bye weeks – to little surprise, given the widespread expectation expansion could be accompanied by a second bye week – is one element where concessions could be required. Others include playing surfaces, travel related to international games and general player compensation.
In 2021, the NFL’s preseason schedule was reduced from four games to three in exchange for the regular season adding a 17th contest. That setup will remain in place for at least a fourth year, but if Howell and the player’s union are open to discussing further changes well in advance of the CBA’s expiration, an 18-game arrangement could be hammered out before the end of the decade.
NFL, NFLPA Discussing 2028 Olympic Flag Football Participation
In October, it was officially announced flag football would be one of the new events introduced at the 2028 Summer Olympics in Los Angeles. Questions have since been raised regarding the participation of NFL players, but talks on that front are already underway.
The NFL played a leading role in the effort to get flag football into the Olympics, so it comes as little surprise the league is interested in having a presence at the event. Numerous active players have publicly stated an intention to participate, but a number of logistical issues need to be worked out. A mutual interest exists between both the NFL and the player’s association with respect to taking part.
NFL EVP Peter O’Reilly confirmed (via Mark Maske of the Washington Post) that “conversations have started” when it comes to working out an agreement with all parties to allow for NFL participation. NFLPA executive director Lloyd Howell cautioned that plenty of detailed discussions will be needed for one to be hammered out when speaking on the subject. He did, however, confirm the appetite on the union’s side for the NFL to have a prominent presence.
“The players want to do it,” Howell said (via Maske). “We’re supportive of the players wanting to do it. The league wants the players to do it. So we’re all for it. No impasse.”
The 2028 Games will take place from July 14-30, a window which falls outside of when NFL training camps usually begin. Matters such as travel costs and insurance in case of injury will need to be sorted out before NFL players are given the go-ahead to compete. As things currently stand, however, signs point to that taking place with plenty of time remaining for negotiations.