Former NFL Players Association president JC Tretter is back. And he’s got a new job.
It’s literally a new job.
Via Ben Fischer of Sports Business Journal, Tretter will serve as the NFLPA’s chief strategy officer. Tretter will report to NFLPA executive director Lloyd Howell.
“He brings continuity with the players and a set of strategic and analytical skills to the team,” spokesman George Atallah told Fischer.
Tretter arrived as president just as the union ratified the 2020 CBA. The league and the NFLPA essentially renegotiated the deal when the pandemic struck. Tretter then presided over the search for a successor to DeMaurice Smith.
The union was criticized, and rightfully so, for a process that lacked transparency. Tretter’s position was that the union didn’t want the media to influence the process. The other side of the coin is that, with no information regarding the candidates or their qualifications available to the players at large, leadership was able to jam its preferred candidate through without proper scrutiny.
And, yes, it’s more than fair to point out that the person Tretter hired has now hired Tretter, which could be regarded as the completion of an express or implied quid pro quo. Especially given the secretive nature of the process that resulted in Howell being hired.
Last year, Tretter’s public comments about players faking injuries sparked a grievance that was due to culminate in an arbitration hearing last month.
