For all the PR ineptitude of the AFLPA, a deal was always going to be reached quickly.
Dolts in the media like Sam McClure always breathlessly hype these battles up with comments like "there's genuine bad blood between the AFL and the AFLPA", "Gil off the record is furious with the players", etc... and then a deal gets done not long after.
call me cynical, but the AFL has a policy to stay high in the public eye. Just another issue to discuss endlessly