Roger Goodell says NFL owners want a labor deal

NFL Commissioner Roger Goodell said Friday that the league is working hard to reach a new labor agreement, and called “absolutely false” the suggestion by the players’ union that team owners stand to benefit from a work stoppage.

“You don’t make money by shutting down your business,” Goodell said at his annual state-of-the-league news conference. “It’s a bad scenario for everybody. I can assure you the ownership and I believe the players -- in talking to individual players -- want to get an agreement and want to work to do that. We are currently committed to do that and I am right there at the forefront.”

His comments came a day after DeMaurice Smith, executive director of the NFL Players Assn., rated the chance of a lockout in 2011 as a “14” on a scale of one to 10. He pointed to the NFL’s decision to quickly extend its TV contracts, which will pay even if there is no football.

“The question is whether there is any other way of interpreting the new television contract. The answer is no,” Smith said. “When you put it in for the first time that there will be almost $5 billion to not play football, what else can you consider it to be?”

Goodell said the sides will continue to meet but “just meeting isn’t good enough. If our objective is to meet, we probably have met that. What you need to do is address the serious concerns that have been raised.”

Goodell addressed several other issues. Among them:

* He said the league cannot assure that a team will return to the Los Angeles area, especially with the NFL labor agreement unresolved. Because they want players to make a bigger contribution to the cost of stadiums, owners are unlikely to continue to commit funds to new stadium construction until a collective bargaining agreement is reached.

“I don’t think we can guarantee a team will be” in L.A., Goodell said. “I think we are working hard to get a team back into the Los Angeles market because we know there are millions of fans that would love to see NFL football as part of their community, and I think progress is being made. . . .

“With the labor agreement that we have, the cost of building that stadium is almost entirely on the ownership, and that is a big burden to pay, particularly in this kind of [economic] environment.”

* He noted that the Chargers for eight years have been “working very hard to get [a stadium deal] done in the San Diego community,” and said they need a new venue.

“Baseball has been addressed in that community in the meantime, and that stadium [Qualcomm Stadium] does need to be fixed for the NFL, which means a new stadium,” he said. “They have had a lot of work done over the years on that. Unfortunately, it hasn’t produced a solution. That has disappointed everybody. I know they continue to focus on that, try to figure out how to get it done, but it is a priority for the Chargers and for the NFL.”

* Goodell plans to lift the suspension of Cleveland Browns receiver Donte Stallworth after the Super Bowl.

Stallworth was suspended in August after he pleaded guilty to DUI manslaughter as a result of striking and killing a pedestrian in March while under the influence of alcohol. The Cleveland Plain Dealer, citing an unnamed source, said the Browns plan to release Stallworth upon his reinstatement.

Freeney update

Colts Coach Jim Caldwell sounded somewhat optimistic Friday about the progress of defensive end Dwight Freeney, recuperating from a severely sprained ankle.

“He’s trending in the right direction,” Caldwell said.

sam.farmer@latimes.com