from Scott Burnside of ESPN,

One long-time executive with a collection of personal and team awards under his belt suggested recently it would be "a battle" to bring the fans back.

"Hope everyone knows how much we have in front of us when we get playing," he told ESPN.com recently.

"We have a lot of goodwill to make up. People are really disappointed in us. We need some real good things to give them cause to come back in the arena."

Paul Swangard, a marketing guru with the University of Oregon's Warsaw Sports Marketing Center, agrees that is a good strategy, especially with so much animosity directed at the league as a whole.

"I think the let-them-play strategy is a good one," he said shortly before a deal was reached early Sunday morning. "I believe the league will let the teams drive the messaging strategy based on local markets. Fans will hopefully blame the league rather than their home team."

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