NFL Players Association's executive director, DeMaurice Smith, is contemplating the idea of permanent decertification. Most people assumed that decertification was a temporary tactical maneuver designed to allow players to seek leverage through the legal system during the NFL lockout. Smith, however, insists that he has embraced decertification as an enduring state of existence, much in the same way that Gene Upshaw did in the early 1990s. In an interview with Yahoo! Sports, Smith revealed that he envisions navigating the NFLPA through a union-free future, even after a possible settlement of the antitrust lawsuit and a new contractual agreement between players and owners. "I've come full circle," Smith said. "When I went into this, my attitude was that the only way you have power is collectively, and I believed in unions as vehicles for employees asserting their rights. But looking back on what Gene experienced and understanding this particular situation, I've now come to appreciate the value of decertification in our particular circumstance. And I don't see why we'd want to go back to being a union."