NFL commissioner Roger Goodell is an interesting sort. He has the polish and charm of the boy commissioner Pete Rozelle but he also knows how to carry the water of team owners like Paul Tagliabue.

Goodell was recently at the Chautauqua Institution up in New York speaking at a sports symposium where he made some pointed comments on the injustice of paying high rookie draft picks enormous amounts of money at the expense of veteran players who are already producing on the field. 

The further point that Goodell was making is that under the current cap system, if a high-priced draft pick is a bust, he still has to be paid the guaranteed money; that guaranteed money is going to count against future years' salary cap totals, and as a result, there will be less money for players who are actually producing. 

"That money is not going to players that are performing," Goodell said. "It's going to a player that never makes it in the NFL. And I think that's ridiculous."

According to news reports, this oration got long, loud applause.  It should have.  It makes a lot of sense.

But are we to understand that NFL owners aren't somehow culpable in how all this evolved? And are we to believe that only the players (and I should say, I suppose, the players' union because some rank-and-file players have pointed out that they are among the most injured parties here) are only to blame in all this?

Actually, what Goodell was doing was taking an opportunity to press the owners' case as they opt out of the current collective bargaining agreement with the union and try to hammer out new terms with the NFL Players Association on a reworked deal. The players' share of revenues is 60 percent under the current CBA and Goodell also made the point that the owners have other problems, such as escalating costs of stadium construction and a wounded economy, that, in Goodell's words, "squeezes the margins and just makes it financially unworkable."

If you think the owners would like to ratchet down that 60 percent that's been going to the players, you'd be on the right track.

What I didn't see in this story about Goodell's presentation was any mention of the tepid performance of the NFL Network so far. If he did, I apologize. But when the NFL brain-trust put that business model together someone clearly didn't count on the push-back the league is currently getting from the cable TV industry or they overestimated the network's appeal. I personally think that eventually the NFL Network will be a big hit and a money-maker for the owners but someone fouled up the calculations on its short- and intermediate-term prospects. So let's be a little honest.  The owners, with all insight they should have into the economy, didn't foresee the current downturn as they pushed ahead with stadium and other capital projects and there's at least one major business decision that's a drag on the league's larger financial picture. And now they'd like the players to help solve their problems.

But Goodell had what he knew would be a home run talking point all lined up -- rookie salaries -- and he belted it out of the park.