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The state of our world has very much been changed this week and we hope all is well with you wherever you are. Looking specifically at what is happening to sports all over the globe, the COVID-19 pandemic has had an enormous impact. Professional sports leagues have cancelled events, suspended seasons, and are doing everything that they can to keep as many people safe as possible.
Thinking about the logistics of this is all very overwhelming and the next few weeks are going to be quite the test for different organizations. The NFL is currently in the middle of the offseason so they do not have games that need to be scheduled or postponed at the moment, but they did cancel the spring owners meetings for what it’s worth.
Free agency will be going on as scheduled
Many people have been wondering during the week of change whether or not the NFL would press on with their new league year beginning this week. As it stands the new league year is set to begin Wednesday, March 18th at 4 PM ET.
The league has now seen a new collective bargaining agreement be agreed to and there were some that thought the voting for it (which concluded Saturday night) might have been what was holding up any sort of potential change.
It appears as if the league feels comfortable enough moving forward. Free agency is a practice that doesn’t necessarily have to involve physical contact (except for physicals).
Now official. NFL sent memo to teams, informing them: Negotiation window noon tomorrow. League year weds. Franchise designation ends tomorrow at noon. Official.
— Adam Schefter (@AdamSchefter) March 15, 2020
It is important to note that while the new league year begins Wednesday at 4 PM ET that the “legal tampering” window opens on Monday, March 16th at 12 PM ET. One minute before that, just before noon, is the deadline for teams to place franchise tags on players.
Will Dak Prescott be tagged? Amari Cooper (this would likely involve a Dak deal before then)? We will seemingly have some answers very soon.