National Football League team owners have voted unanimously to break off talks with the players union over a salary cap, a move that could mean several veteran players will become free agents.
The team owners met for less than one hour Thursday and decided to abide by a decision by the NFL executive committee to reject the union's latest proposal.
The two sides had hoped to add between $10-$15 million per team to the salary cap. However, now the current cap of $94.5 million will remain in place. Without the additional room, several teams might be forced to cut players in order to get under the current salary limit.
The league has said that 2007 would be a year with no salary cap. That move could lead to a situation similar to Major League Baseball, where a rich few teams buy the best players while small market teams cannot afford stars.
Some information for this report was provided by AP.