The NFL lockout was lifted Monday.
And confusion has reigned today.
Niners free-agent linebacker and player representative Takeo Spikes said on KNBR this afternoon that a few players showed up at the team facility in Santa Clara today. Spikes said they were met by a team executive and told not to work out in the weight room or on the practice field.
“We’re locked out. We’re locked in. It’s hard to tell what’s going on,” Spikes said. “Last I heard a few guys that wanted to go work out, they were met by a quote-unquote senior executive and told that they were more than welcome to come in, but you cannot use any of the weight room equipment or go out on the field or do any workouts.”
Team spokesman Bob Lange explained the team’s protocol in an e-mail prior to Spikes’ interview: “Any player who arrives at the facility will meet with a senior staff member. No football activities will be scheduled to take place until there is more clarity from the legal proceedings.”
U.S. District Judge Susan Nelson, who lifted the lockout, has said she will decide Wednesday whether to put a stay on her ruling during the NFL’s appeal.
If a stay is granted, it’s conceivable today could be the only day of the NFL’s offseason. With that in mind, some players who can collect workout bonuses showed up to work today. Just in case.
“I do have a workout bonus,” Redskins linebacker Lorenzo Alexander said in this ESPN.com story. “… I wanted to make sure I took full advantage to come up here and work out because I don’t want some technicality to happen later: ‘You didn’t show up. You didn’t come.’ And then I’m out of my workout bonus.”
According to ESPN, Niners tight end Vernon Davis will collect a $200,000 workout bonus if he participates in 90 percent of the team’s workouts.
“What we do hate as players is that a lot of guys have a lot of money in workout bonuses in contracts,” Spikes said. “From that aspect when you’re told … you can’t go in there and make a workout count toward a certain percentage that you have to make, then that’s where it gets real hard to understand because it’s in your contract.”
• Spikes counted himself among the group enthused by Harbaugh’s hiring.
“From the players’ standpoint, I think the consensus was it was a great hire not only for the team, but it was a great hire for the fans,” Spikes said. “Now everybody is excited. The players are excited just because we know the pedigree that he comes from, especially me.
“I had the opportunity to play against him (in the NFL) a long time ago. And I watched him growing up in college and high school so I understand. I feel like it was a great hire. And I feel like he has pretty much assembled a staff of guys who are good football junkies.”
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