Union Sees Gains in N.F.L. Bottom Line

TAMPA, Fla. — After a contentious search process, N.F.L. players will select a new union chief in six weeks, and that’s when the real contentions will begin.

The union said here Thursday that a study it commissioned showed that teams made an average profit of at least $24 million last year, even though owners, who have opted out of the existing labor agreement, have claimed that the financial crisis is squeezing their margins, and has caused some teams and the league office to lay off employees.

Players receive about 60 percent of revenue, a figure that owners said was untenable when they opted out of the agreement last spring, only two years after the deal was struck.

“The bottom line for players is they want to retain and improve upon what they already have in the collective bargaining agreement,” said Richard Berthelsen, the union’s acting executive director. “Football is a very good business. The revenue pie has continued to grow. The players see no reason why their slice of that pie should be any smaller in the future.”

The 2009 season will be the final one with a salary cap unless a new deal is reached before the next league year begins in March 2010. Gene Upshaw, the union’s longtime executive director, died last August. Berthelsen said the league had told him that it would make no new offer in negotiations until the union selected Upshaw’s successor.

If a new deal is not reached before the start of the 2010 league year, the 2010 season will be played with no cap. Kevin Mawae, the union’s president, on Thursday reiterated one of Upshaw’s central bargaining positions: that if the cap ever goes, players would never accept it again. Mawae said a system without a cap could only benefit players, but the lack of an agreement could also end with a doomsday scenario: a lockout that would test the resolve of players to stick together.

EAGLES’ JOHNSON HAS CANCER Philadelphia’s defensive coordinator, Jim Johnson, has had a recurrence of skin cancer, this time in his spine. The Eagles’ trainer, Rick Burkholder, told both The Philadelphia Inquirer and The Philadelphia Daily News on Thursday that Johnson was diagnosed as having melanoma on Monday at Pennsylvania Hospital. Burkholder said Johnson had begun radiation treatments at Bryn Mawr Hospital.

Burkholder said Johnson had a bone tumor in his back, in the same area where skin cancer was diagnosed in 2001. No surgery is scheduled for Johnson and he intends to continue coaching, Burkholder said. (AP)

HART A PROUD ALUMNUS No, Jim Hart said, he did not think the Cardinals would make the Super Bowl in his lifetime.

But he is now a believer. Hart, the former St. Louis Cardinals quarterback, proudly wore a Cardinals Alumni jacket Thursday at a news conference for Gridiron Greats, a nonprofit organization that provides financial assistance for retired N.F.L. players.

“I think they’ll be a force to be reckoned with for a long time,” Hart, 64, said.

The last time the Cardinals were a title contender, Hart was their quarterback, leading the Cardiac Cardinals to the playoffs in 1974 and 1975. They did not win a playoff game under Hart, who was in St. Louis for 18 seasons and remained popular there after his retirement in 1984.

A few years later, the Cardinals departed for Phoenix, and St. Louis was football-less until the Rams arrived in 1995, forging their own identity late in the decade by winning the Super Bowl.

“Those of us in St. Louis thought that we were a group of guys without a team,” said Hart, the Cardinals’ career passing leader. “Because after the Rams won, they didn’t want anything to do with us, either. Then, of course, with the Cardinals being gone, the distance made it not real conducive to staying in touch. So when people ask about my team leaving St. Louis, I say: ‘My team didn’t leave. The players that I played with, most of them, are still in St. Louis, and that’s my team.’ ”(NAILA-JEAN MEYERS )

STEELER INJURY CONCERNS For the first time this week, Hines Ward’s knee was not the only talked-about body part. Attention on Thursday turned to Ben Roethlisberger’s back. “Ben’s health is often the subject of inaccurate reports,” Coach Mike Tomlin told the designated pool reporter after practice. “He’s fine.”

According to the pool report, Roethlisberger appeared to be trying to stretch his mid-torso region during practice, but otherwise he had an effective workout in the rain. Roethlisberger was hit hard in the ribs/back area in the A.F.C. championship game against Baltimore, but did not miss a play.

Ward, who has faced questions for two weeks about his sprained right knee, practiced for the first time since being hurt in the A.F.C title game. Ward worked with the regular offense, blocking and catching passes but running at three-quarters speed. (NAILA-JEAN MEYERS)