In any given spring, NFL owners would have to dig deep into the coffers if required to pay time-and-a-half rates to personnel directors and scouts who work more than 40 hours a week.

This year, the owners would be forced into bankruptcy.

Because a quirk in the league calendar has resulted in a bizarre daily double, with the free agency signing period and the pre-draft combine workouts in Indianapolis both starting Friday, personnel departments leaguewide have logged plenty of overtime in recent weeks. While the scouts are accustomed to multi-tasking endeavors, the reality of having to prepare simultaneously for the two critical offseason events has resulted in a time crunch, as well as some frayed nerves.

	“	It's going to be a wild time in Indy, because there will still be some teams trying to do early (free agent) signings, and watching the workouts. I can tell you, the last few weeks have been a rat race, having to work on both things at once. ”
		— Tom Donahoe on the combine and free agency starting at the same time

Good thing for owners that scouts and personnel chiefs aren't unionized, because working double shifts has become the norm.

The vice president of personnel for one NFC team estimated that, with the time he has invested restructuring contracts to get under the salary cap and preparing for free agency and the combine workouts, he averaged 17 hours per day at the office last week. That included working all day Saturday and most of Sunday afternoon.

The only reason he wasn't in the office early Sunday, he noted, was that his wife demanded he accompany her and their children to church.

"In my opinion, it's poor planning, because it's really taxed everyone," said Buffalo Bills general manager Tom Donahoe. "I'm sure it probably has something to do with the collective bargaining agreement, but I'd still prefer they move free agency back a couple weeks, because we'd still be able to get everything accomplished. It's going to be a wild time in Indy, because there will still be some teams trying to do early (free agent) signings, and watching the workouts. I can tell you, the last few weeks have been a rat race, having to work on both things at once."

It remains to be seen just what the hectic workload means in terms of evaluating free agents and draft prospects. There comes a point when the 10-hour personnel meetings many teams have convened the past few weeks become counterproductive. At its core, scouting is a business of sweating the details, and with the combine and free agency starting the same day, personnel directors and general managers fear they could cut too many corners as they attempt to prepare for both.

"To say it's been hectic," acknowledged Baltimore vice president Ozzie Newsome, "would be the understatement of the year."

Certainly diverted attention could result in mixed results in the draft and free agency.

"There comes a time when you have to focus on one thing or another," said Carolina personnel director Jack Bushofsky. "I really don't think you can work both things together and do the best job. You just end up doing it half-assed. The fortunate thing for us is that we won't be very active in free agency at the start anyway. But you still have to evaluate the guys and have some idea of the market. It's a mess this year the way these two things fall on the same day."

Contributing to the time crunch, which really began when clubs started meeting to decide which players they would expose to the Houston Texans in last week's expansion draft, is that several of the top colleges have workout sessions scheduled for draft prospects only a few days after the combine concludes. Scouts will finish the combine work, go home for a change of clothes and then hit the road again for individual draft workouts.

There is some suspicion that, given the lack of quality in a free-agent pool regarded by most as the thinnest since the current system was adopted in 1993, there will be few quick veteran signings this year. Many teams are still cap-strapped and will barely be able to squeeze under the $71.101 million spending limit by the Friday deadline for cap compliance.

Always notorious for making at least one blockbuster deal in the opening hours of free agency, sometimes just after the midnight start to the signing period, the cap-bloated Jacksonville Jaguars are in no position for a quick strike this time around. Plus, former Jaguars vice president Michael Huyghue, who engineered those fast signings and probably bent a few tampering rules to do so, is now a player agent.

The success of the New England Patriots, who won a Super Bowl championship after signing 21 bargain-basement veterans, will prompt some owners to wait until the free-agent market is better defined before diving in, and that will slow the usual first-week flurry. And the anticipated player cuts this week, with some high-profile performers about to be jettisoned, means teams will have to take time to evaluate those new candidates.

That said there are some teams still hell-bent on jumping out early in free agency, and even with the time crunch precipitated by combine preparations, it's safe to assume there will be a few deals consummated on Friday. The Miami Dolphins, for instance, are setting up a fully-equipped office in their Indianapolis hotel, complete with computers and faxes, to be ready for free agency.

"All you need anyway," said one AFC personnel chief, "is a cell phone."

The typical scene at the annual Friday agents meeting in Indianapolis -- representatives ducking out of the session with cell phones to their ears and chatting it up with general managers who are indicating an interest in one of their free-agent clients -- might be taken to the extreme this year. Even if deals aren't being completed, teams will check in with the agents to apprise them of their interest. In fact, the manager of the hotel at which the meeting will be held might want to request that all cell-phone ringers be silenced, or the din could be ear drum-shattering.

But the agents, between babysitting new clients at the combine and monitoring the developments in free agency, figure to be just as distracted as the personnel directors. They will spend part of the time attempting to pitch their draft prospects to personnel men and the other part trying hard to create a market for their unemployed veterans.

Conventional wisdom is that the groundwork will be laid in Indianapolis for some free agency deals but that not many will be consummated until the combine ends next Monday afternoon and teams can turn their full attention to the veteran market.

The combine workouts this year are later than in most seasons, in part because the NFL wants to force more prospects to participate in the sessions. The rationale is that by moving the combine closer to the draft and shortening the time in between, players won't have as much time for their preferred on-campus workouts.

Next year, the combine is pushed up a few weeks, closer to the usual mid-February dates.

"The timing this year is just crazy," said agent Pat Dye, who has some top-shelf veterans looking for jobs and several well-regarded draft prospects. "It really is driving everybody over the edge."

Len Pasquarelli is a senior NFL writer for ESPN.com.