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The Josh Gordon saga may be approaching its final conclusion.
Chris Mortensen and Adam Schefter, NFL insiders for ESPN, are reporting that the NFL Players Association will have its 32 team representatives vote on an offer from the league on Tuesday, completely revamping the NFL's drug testing policy, which would include HGH testing for the first time.
Mortensen specified further that the two sides have not yet reached an agreement on all of the issues as of Monday night, but they are close enough to plan on holding that vote. This comes after an entire day of face-to-face negotiations in New York.
These reports also reiterate what was heard last week in that the proposed new drug policy would increase the threshold for marijuana and move offseason amphetamine use to the "substances of abuse" category.
How this will impact players such as Gordon and Wes Welker is still unclear, but the rumblings are good for them thus far:
One late sticking point is that the league has received complaints and concerns from owners regarding possible reinstatement for recently suspended players such as Josh Gordon of the Cleveland Browns and Wes Welker of the Denver Broncos, who would not have been suspended under the proposed policy. Those owners were displeased that a new agreement would not necessarily alter the standing of their own suspended players.
Nevertheless, there are numerous unidentified players in the league's substance-abuse program who would benefit from the changes, sources said.
‣ UPDATE 9/10:
The vote was not held during the scheduled conference call on Wednesday night between the NFLPA team reps. As reported by Mike Florio of Pro Football Talk, this indicates that the offer from the league wasn't considered good enough to even warrant a vote.
Not long after the news broke that a vote wouldn't take place and thoughts about the possibility that the negotiations could break down similar to last year, Jay Glazer of FOX Sports reported some more details about the ongoing situation:
There are still 5 issues at hand the nflpa and NFL still need to iron out. Union hoping to have an update for players within 24 hours
— Jay Glazer (@JayGlazer) September 10, 2014
Although the process thus far has been arduous, it does appear that the player's union truly wants to reach a resolution here, despite turning down the latest proposal from the league.
George Atallah, assistant executive director of external affairs at the NFLPA, has stressed as much on Twitter following the conference call last night:
Collective bargaining is hard and we review proposals and issues comprehensively. We will continue to work on a solution.
— George Atallah (@GeorgeAtallah) September 10, 2014