CLEVELAND, Ohio (92.3 The Fan) – JC Tretter has been vocal in recent months when it comes to the NFL’s offseason program and how unnecessary some of it has become.
The president of the NFLPA, and Browns center, is now urging fellow players across the league not to participate in-person this year should teams be allowed to hold OTAs.
“We’ve been telling them, it’s voluntary and we’re not gonna go,” Tretter said, according to NFL Network’s Tom Pelissero.
What the 2021 offseason program, which is supposed to begin April 19th, will include has yet to be negotiated.
“We're continuing to bargain about off season. And those conversations with the league are continuing, even as we speak,” NFLPA executive director DeMaurice Smith said on March 31.
Tretter wants it to and believes it should remain virtual.
“The changes implemented as a result of the COVID-19 crisis proved that we can make the game safer for our players and the product will not suffer,” Tretter wrote in his monthly column posted on the NFLPA’s website in March.
Tretter didn’t mince words when it came to player safety on the field and off it while COVID-19 remains prevalent.
“Right now we are not normal. The NFL doesn't get to decide when the pandemic is over or when we get to stop caring about COVID,” Tretter said on March 31. “COVID is still out there. Our players do not want to catch it still. There are plenty of guys who have talked about issues that they felt for a long time after catching COVID – Myles [Garrett] being one of them, talked about it all year, about how he felt that it was still bothering him.
“So, guys don't want to catch something and make themselves vulnerable to that in the middle of unnecessary practices in the springtime, that could impact them during games in the fall. So the conversation about what should be going on post COVID, I don't even think we should go there right now.”
Last month the NFL sent a memo to teams indicating that they will not mandate players get vaccinated, but the hope is they will choose to get them.
“I think we have to do everything we can to make sure that we message that the vaccines are safe, that people should get them,” Smith said. “We know that there's groups of people who have a number of feelings about the vaccine, that could be based on all sorts of things. We wanted to make sure that we were in a position to answer every question about the vaccine, to engage in any public efforts about getting people vaccinated. Some players have come out on their own to talk about that. Every now and then I think our focus is rightly on something bigger than football.”
Tretter pointed out that the virtual offseason in 2020 resulted in a 235 decrease in injuries that caused players to miss time and a 30% reduction in concussions during the season and the quality of play did not suffer.
“Over the past five years, the average number of missed-time injuries annually for all NFL teams was 3,524,” Tretter wrote. “For the 2020 season, the number of missed time injuries decreased to 2,716.”
The concussion data stands out the most.
Tretter noted that, “During the last five NFL seasons, an average of 247 concussions were reported per year. In 2020, 172 concussions were reported. Without preseason games -- games that typically result in an average of 46 concussions per year -- we were able to avoid those injuries entirely. The training camp ramp-up took our concussions per training camp practice from 1 in every 17 practices in 2019 to 1 concussion in every 20 practices in 2020.
“In my opinion, finding ways to reduce concussions should be a top priority for the NFL. If we’ve identified strategies for reducing concussions by 30% and it doesn’t involve modifying game rules, it would be reckless NOT to implement those changes.”
In addition to discouraging players from attending any team workouts, Tretter and the NFLPA is also discouraging players from assembling on their own to work out in groups together.
While what future NFL offseasons in normal times may look like remains to be seen, but for now Tretter and the NFLPA’s focus is squarely on dealing with COVID and keeping everyone safe leading up to the 2021 season.
“We're facing the same issues we faced last year,” Tretter said. “I think the fact that we have that layout, we have that plan, I think it would be a shame if we didn't utilize what we know works.
“So, right now we are still facing COVID. There's still now a uptick in positive cases. Dr. Fauci, has talked about the chance of a fourth wave. The CDC director has talked about the chance of a fourth wave, as we're seeing this uptick slash plateau of cases.”
