Labor Contract, Collective Bargaining Agreement | featured news

Baseball players and owners have signed an agreement for a new labor contract, a deal that starts blood testing on human growth hormone and expands the playoffs to 10 teams by 2013.

No labor deal, no training camps and no telling what else the NBA could lose. The lockout is about to start inflicting damage on the preseason schedule — and neither players nor owners can say what will happen to the real games. The league will cancel training camps and some exhibition games Friday after failing to reach a new collective bargaining agreement with its players, a person with knowledge of the plans told The Associated Press on Thursday on condition of anonymity because the league had yet to announce its plans.

With the NFL on the brink of its first work stoppage in nearly a quarter of a century, Commissioner Roger Goodell and union head DeMaurice Smith met at a federal mediator's office Friday, the day the league's twice-extended labor contract was set to expire....