It was just a few short weeks ago that Mike Florio and Pablo Torre teamed up to expose a secret NFL collusion ruling.
The founder of Pro Football Talk and the host of Pablo Torre Finds Out joined forces in a quiet race to uncover a secret the NFL would’ve preferred stayed buried: a confidential arbitration ruling that found league executives had pushed owners to suppress guaranteed player contracts.
In an episode released last month, Torre revealed that he and Florio had been in a friendly competition to track down the ruling tied to the NFLPA’s collusion grievance against the league. Torre ultimately beat Florio to the document, and once they obtained it, the implications were hard to ignore.
Now, ESPN’s Don Van Natta Jr. and Kalyn Kahler have taken the story a step further, confirming not only the ruling itself but also revealing that the NFL and the NFL Players Association had quietly agreed to keep the decision hidden from the players.
According to ESPN’s reporting, the Jan. 14 decision from arbitrator Christopher Droney concluded there wasn’t enough direct evidence of collusion among owners following Deshaun Watson’s fully guaranteed 2022 contract. But the ruling did find that commissioner Roger Goodell and league counsel Jeff Pash urged owners to resist fully guaranteed deals, a move that, while not technically collusion, still undermines the league’s collective bargaining agreement.
So why didn’t players know about it? Because the NFL and NFLPA — led by executive director Lloyd Howell Jr. — struck a mutual confidentiality agreement that kept the ruling sealed until Torre’s podcast made it public two weeks ago. Multiple union members told ESPN they were stunned to learn what had been kept from them and were frustrated by the lack of transparency from their own leadership.
Florio, for his part, called out not just the league and the union, but the NFL’s media partners for failing to report on what he saw as a massive breach of trust. ESPN eventually followed through, and now, nearly six months after the ruling, the NFLPA has decided to appeal.
Torre/Florio found the ruling. ESPN revealed the cover-up. Now the union has to answer for it.