Comments on a podcast were costly for NFLPA Chief Strategy Officer JC Tretter, and it might explain why NFLPA leadership helped the NFL bury the collusion documents
The hits just keep on coming for former Green Bay Packers offensive lineman, former NFLPA President and current NFLPA Chief Strategy Officer JC Tretter. According to Palbo Torre, who broke the news that the NFLPA chose to withhold documentation of the NFL’s owners attempting to collude over guaranteed money, a second non-disclosure agreement was signed between the NFL and NFLPA.
What was in this second secret document? It’s that the NFL won a grievance against the union regarding players faking injuries to “create leverage” during contract disputes, something Tretter alluded to on a podcast back in 2023 when running back salaries were a hot-button topic. On the surface, this looks like a little bit of horse trading. Tretter doesn’t tell the players that owners attempted to collude on guaranteed money, and the NFL doesn’t swipe at Tretter’s judgment of public comments.
Mind you, this isn’t the first time that Tretter has been accused of making decisions to further his career rather than putting the best interests of the players in mind. When Tretter was president of the NFLPA, a role that a person can only begin to serve while still a player in the NFL, the union conducted a secretive search for its next Executive Director, the non-player leader of the NFLPA. Some players were unhappy with this decision, leading to only 48 of the 128 player representatives showing up to the meeting where a vote was held on whether Lloyd Howell would be named Executive Director or not.
And then what did Howell do once Tretter’s tenure as President of the NFLPA expired due to his retirement from the league? He created a brand new position for Tretter: Chief Strategy Officer. Instead of graduating out of the union, Tretter now had a job, thanks to the person he helped get in front of player reps for the yes/no vote.
Since the initial report that the NFL and NFLPA came to a confidentiality agreement over the findings of the collusion case, where arbitrators essentially stated there was an attempt from owners to collude, but no collusion actually happened, the NFLPA has now begun the appeals process on the arbitrators’ ruling.
Another piece of recent news, dropped by ESPN, is that Howell apparently has been working as a part-time consultant for The Carlyle Group, which is part of a “consortium” of pre-approved private equity firms that are allowed to buy up to 10 percent of NFL franchises. Last year, the Miami Dolphins’ ownership sold part of its stake in the team to Ares Management, and the Buffalo Bills had the same arrangement with Arctos.
Beyond Ares and Arctos, the NFL has also pre-approved Sixth Street and a “consortium” made up of Blackstone, Carlyle, CVC Capital Partners, Dynasty Equity and Ludis.
Oh yeah, Howell also was the chief financial officer of Booz Allen when they were accused of fraud and had to write a $377 million settlement with the United States government. He’s also under investigation for what The Athletic calls “attempting to make a change that could lead to [his] own financial gain, potentially at the expense of union members,” in regards to a licensing group called OneTeam Partners.
OneTeam Partners is co-owned by the players’ unions of the NFL, MLB, MLS, WNBA and U.S Women’s National Team. According to an ESPN report in May, the FBI opened a probe on the company, which is “used to strike media deals and monetize athletes’ name, image and likeness.”
To say the absolute least, there are plenty of reasons for the players to question whether the combination of Tretter and Howell should remain in leadership positions in the union. On Sunday, the NFLPA executive committee released a statement backing Howell, but Torre reports that a group of player reps — which doesn’t include current President and Detroit Lions linebacker Jalen Reeves-Maybin — is now doing a private investigation of their own into Howell, stemming from the OneTeam Partners situation, before any of this document burying came to light.
You can watch Torre’s hour-long video below: