NFL Hopes to Resume Talks Soon; 50-Man Rosters Approved

National Football League officials said Tuesday that they hope to resume bargaining with the players union soon, but with a revised offer on one of the main issues because the players’ pension fund lost $39 million in the stock market turmoil of the past two weeks.

Jack Donlan, executive director of the NFL Management Council, said he expects to speak next week with Gene Upshaw, president of the players’ union, to try to resume negotiations. Earlier, Commissioner Pete Rozelle had said he hopes negotiations could be concluded by next March so the league can go ahead with its expansion plans.

The owners also voted to play the rest of the season with 50-man rosters--45 players active each Sunday and a five-man reserve squad.

But the main topic of the discussion was the 24-day strike that ended Oct. 15 and its after-effects, including the antitrust suit filed by the union against the owners when the players went back to work. Among other things, it seeks the free agency the players were unable to get at the bargaining table.

During the strike, it was the players who constantly sought negotiations. This time it is the owners.

However, the union said it wasn’t interested in resuming talks unless the owners changed their position on major issues. And any talks may be complicated by the effect of the stock market on the pension fund, a major area of contention between the two sides.

Donlan disclosed that “the last time I checked” what had once been a $40-million surplus in the pension fund had been reduced to $1 million by losses from the fund’s stock market investments.

The owners have been offering to add $37 million to the fund, but $18 million of that is money the owners never put in and is now in contention in a separate lawsuit.

In another matter, the owners approved two exhibition games outside the United states next summer--the Chicago Bears against the Minnesota Vikings in Goteborg, Sweden, next Aug. 12 or 13 and the New York Jets vs. the Cleveland Browns in Montreal between Aug. 18 and 22.