After 136 days, the NFL lockout is officially ready to come to a conclusion. Player reps from each of the 32 NFL teams voted on Monday to approve the new collective bargaining agreement, signaling that football is officially back.
The vote on the new CBA was unanimous, as first tweeted by the NFLPA's George Attalah. According to Albert Breer, the vote serves as a recommendation to the plaintiffs in the Brady v. NFL case to approve the settlement. The plaintiffs have already agreed to do just that, so you can basically stick a fork in the NFL lockout.
The next step to officially wrap up the labor situation is for players from around the league to vote on recertifying the NFLPA. This vote is expected to happen over a few days later this week when players start reporting to their team facilities. Once the vote happens and the union is recertified, the new CBA can officially go into effect.
With the new collective bargaining agreement being 10 years long and including no opt-out clauses, fans won't have to worry about another lockout until at least 2021. That means that starting now and for the next decade, fans can worry strictly about football. That is, perhaps, the best news of all.