NFL Owners, Disappointed With Season To Date, Reduce Salaries To 1958 Levels

NFL team owners, distressed by poor play, dull games, and low ratings in the early part of the 2009 season, have voted unanimously to reduce players' salaries to 1958 levels.

"We're only going to pay $6,500 to $8,500 a year for our star players," Dallas Cowboys owner Jerry Jones told a hastily assembled Dallas news conference. "The rest of the players will get bags of groceries or beer. Subpar play gets subpar pay."

In the 1950s, prior to enormous TV contracts, NFL players received minimal salaries and "played for the love of the game," Jones said. "They knew that if it weren't for the NFL, they'd be loading trucks for a living. Their gratitude to their owners was evident in the quality of their play."

Today's players, Jones said, "are so spoiled that they won't play even if their little finger hurts," an obvious reference to Cowboys quarterback Tony Romo's recent injury. "Back in the day, you had broken ribs, or brain damage, or you needed amputation, you kept on playing."

Jones said that owners would continue to pay players "approximately $500 a game" until the quality of play improved "or until their lawyers force us to honor our contracts with them. But at $6,500 a year, they can't even put down a retainer on a lawyer. We think we're sitting pretty."