The Sports Xchange

According to a Washington Post report, the NFL and the NFL Players Association could begin discussions regarding a revised player-disciplinary system this season.

Those talks, from the league’s perspective, could result in an extension of the two sides’ Collective Bargaining Agreement, which currently runs through 2020.

Specifically, changing Commissioner Roger Goodell’s role in in player discipline will likely be one of the key items on the table. Goodell’s four-game suspension of New England Patriots quarterback Tom Brady was recently overturned in court, leading to questions about the commissioner’s future regarding disciplinary matters.

“We need to make changes ideally in negotiation with the union and ideally in conjunction with an extension of the CBA,” a high-ranking official with one NFL team, quoted anonymously, told the Post. “It could come pretty quickly. I think maybe by the end of the season.”

Brady’s court victory was the latest in a series of successful challenges of player discipline imposed by the league.

Under the current CBA, Goodell has the right to handle appeals of league disciplinary measures in cases involving the integrity of the sport and cases under the personal-conduct policy. The union would rather these cases be decided by neutral arbitration.

Goodell told ESPN Radio last week that he is open to changing his role in the disciplinary process but also expressed reluctance to surrender his authority to resolve appeals in certain cases.