[UPDATE: In speaking with Mr. Schefter, he states that this report is false.]

Earlier this month, we heard that contract negotiations between NFL.com and its top reporter, Adam Schefter, had gone south. Yesterday, the Watchdog reported that Schefter’s work – by all accounts, he was NFL.com’s version of Fox’s Jay Glazer and ESPN’s Chris Mortensen – had not appeared since March 3rd, he had made no TV appearances, and he wasn’t present at the owner’s meetings in California.

[Quick aside: Where have you heard this President's Day prediction before? August 2008.]

We hear that contract negotiations went so poorly – a source says the NFL Network offered a raise in the neighborhood of 100k a year, but Schefter’s CAA agents held out for a million a year – that Schefter was told to turn in his blackberry and that he’d be paid until August, when his contract expired.

Creative Artists Agency, which also reps Mortensen, is driving a hard bargain. On one hand, their demands help all the other writer/TV hybrid folks because it drives their value up. (For instance: We previously reported that ESPN’s Michael Smith signed a multi-year $1.1 million deal.) On the other hand … a failure to get the deal done leaves Schefter out of the mix in the midst of this brutal economy and with the NFL draft a month away.

After the NCAA tournament wraps up April 6, and the two-day season-opening buzz of MLB wears off, it’ll be all draft, all the time for the next two weeks. How will NFL.com do without its big gun?