"NFL general counsel Jeff Pash was one of the last to file out of a conference room at the downtown Westin following a Monday night meeting with the league's labor committee.

His message to the media was one he has voiced for months, and one he will continue to endorse as long as the labor dispute separates owners and players.

Pash insisted the time is right to reach a new collective bargaining agreement and ensure no disruption in the upcoming preseason and regular season. And that resolution will come at the bargaining table, not through ongoing litigation.

"I haven't given up and I'm not going to give up,'' Pash said at the onset of the NFL owners' spring meetings. "Maybe six months from now you'll all be standing here and saying, 'Well, you're a dope. You kept saying that things were going to get better.' It may be that I'll turn out to be wrong.

"I'm going to continue to believe that smart people and people who have the most substantial incentives to reach an agreement and to get the game back on the field will figure out how to do it.''"