January 18, 2011

Retirement paperwork?

All day Monday you either read or heard that Brett Favre turned in his retirement paperwork. But what exactly does that mean? Remember that CBA that the NFL and NFLPA had? The retirement paperwork stems from a player looking to collect his severance pay under the CBA. When a player exits the NFL he is entitled to money for each of his credited league years. Andy Brandt of the National Football Post has a nice article on the meaning of the Favre retirement papers. For any even more detailed explanation of severance pay check out this link from the NFLPA.

Pujols won't talk contract once spring training starts

St. Louis Cardinals slugger Albert Pujols will enter the final year of his contract this season. But once spring training commences Pujols has said there will be no contract talks. Pujols says this will cause too much of a distraction to his team if talks go into the beginning of the season. Pujols agent is Dan Lozano. Before last season Joe Mauer had a similar philosophy going into contract talks with the Twins. However, Mauer said that contract talks would cease once the regular season started. Of course the Twins and Mauer reached an agreement before the season started. To refresh your memory on Mauer and his negotiations, see the SLT blog of December 2, 2009.