NEW YORK — Chris Broussard of ESPN is reporting that details are being finalized for a 1 p.m. meeting today.
So it appears commissioner David Stern will agree to one more sitdown with the union to try to make a deal before today’s “close of business” deadline for the players to accept or reject the offer the owners put on the table Saturday night.
Stern told NBA-TV he would first have to speak to the owners’ Labor Relations Committee before agreeing to another sitdown. Union director Billy Hunter was openly wondering last night, after the union said it was open to making further financial concessions, whether Stern still has the juice to get a deal past the finish line.
“My concern, what I’m trying to determine, is whether or not David may be a hostage in his own camp,” Hunter said. “That’s what kind of concerns me. He may not have the sway that he once had. He’s been a hell of a commissioner, but it’s not the first time I’ve made this statement of whether he has the control and sway that he has historically had.”
The typical American spends $28,000 on a brand new car.
The online network offers enough web services that carry
upon themselves the task to give out the names and holdings of big investors.
The United States is the third largest producer of petroleum in the world.
I wonder if many current NBA players understand that if this thing blows up and they decertify, most of them are never going to get another NBA paycheck.
I agree with Showtime. Let’s be honest though, even if the owners get the deal that they want, most of them will still screw it up and complain next time around and I can bet that the prices of tickets, merch, food etc will not go down.
I’m not sure why the players think they have any leverage. Most of the owners don’t want to start the season with the current deal because they’ll actually lose less money by canceling the season than having to pay the players their existing contracts.
It’s ridiculous that they think there’s a chance they’ll better their position by not agreeing to this deal. In July when they’re all completely broke they’ll be happy to agree to a 45% BRI deal with a hard cap.
Mark:
I respect your opinions, but I honestly think you and many others are a little confused and mistaken about this idea that big market teams are easily able to steal away stars from small market teams.
It’s simply not true.
Unlike baseball where there is no salary cap, no team in the NBA has the capability to just go out and sign big money players every offseason. With the salary cap — even the soft cap that had been in place for many years in the previous CBA’s — the only way a team (big market or small market) can attain a “superstar” who is worthy of big dollars is if they are significantly under the salary cap.
Everyone looks at the summer of 2010 and automatically assumes that the big market franchises could just attract all the superstars and the small markets have no leverage.
That’s wrong.
Leading up to 2010, when everyone knew guys like LeBron, Wade, Bosh, Amare, Joe Johnson etc. — several teams decided to free up their payrolls in an effort to get way under the salary cap for that year so they can (based on cap rules and regulations) have the financial capability to sign those players. This is how Miami, New York and Chicago all were able to make a run at the big known free agents. Remember, the Heat, Knicks and Bulls had been three of the worst teams in the NBA combined the last few years (for NY, they had made the playoffs just once between 2002 and 2010)
It has nothing to do with how much money owners have in their pockets. There are rules in place that either allow or disallow any teams from offering contracts to superstar players.
Exactly. I don’t know why this concept is so hard for some people to grasp. What we saw in 2010 was the exception, not the rule. Generally speaking, stars do not change teams via free agency. And when they do leave, it is usually because they are tired of incompetent people running the team, with Kevin Garnett being example 1-A. Example 2: Elton Brand left LA to go to a smaller market. Danny Granger re-signed with IND. Roy re-signed with POR. Nash re-signed with PHX. Yao re-signed with HOU. Redd re-signed with MIL. Pierce stayed in BOS. Iverson stayed in PHI. DET was able to keep all of its players during the 2000s. And it wasn’t that long ago when Kobe wanted out of LA.
There is simply not enough cap space on the “big” market teams to collect “all” the star players. For example, where exactly is Dwight Howard going to go? Chris Paul? Deron Williams? Not NY, not LA, not CHI. And let’s say by some miracle it happens. What big market is Russell Westbrook going to? Not a star, but I’m sure Marc Gasol would like to play with the Lakers. Not gonna happen.
The better argument (not one that I agree with) is that the inability to sign mid-level players is what hurts competitive balance. DAL and LA can use their MLE every year, whereas a team like SAC or NO may not be able to. The easy answer to that problem is revenue sharing.
Not to mention the elephant in the room, which is that the NBA probably needs to lose 3-4 teams. New Orleans cannot support a pro team. But if the NBA and Stern think it is vital to have a team there and in Charlotte, then the owners should subsidize it.
Beginning with the Celtics and then extending to the Lakers, Heat and Knicks, we were starting to witness the formation of mini all star teams. It was reported that Chris Paul announced the next “big three” at Melo’s wedding. Once the star players aligned, teams were free to use the MLE to fill in the missing parts.
So the owners are trying to push back against the concept of the players calling the shots and attempting to exert some control over a handful of mini all star teams competing against teams that can’t put that together.
My MAIN POINT is this: where is the reporting on this? Whether you agree or disagree, the owners are trying to keep the NBA competitive for all and there has been little talk about it. I have my theories as to why the NBA writers have been silent on this (agents come to mind) but have no proof other than speculation.
Mark:
You are absolutely correct.
As for your question about reporting, I think the answer is this: many reporters do not really grasp what the owners are trying to do here.
Many reporters are clinging to the concept that the NBA’s salary cap doesn’t really cap much of anything anymore, and that if the system does not undergo some fundamental changes,
about 20 teams will have no realistic chance of winning a championship.
I don’t agree with that at all.
We need to really analyze NBA history to correctly assess what it takes to be successful on the court, and specifically win championships.
There are three ways that teams become championship-worthy:
1) The Draft
At times in the down cycle of a franchise when a team is in the draft lottery, the decisions teams make is critical. Example: Portland took Greg Oden with the first pick in the 2007 NBA Draft, while Seattle because of that pick ended up with Kevin Durant. Right now, Portland is spiraling because of injuries and failed expectations, while OKC (formerly Seattle) is thriving because of the 2007 NBA Draft.
This has nothing to do with market or how much money is in the owners wallets.
2) Salary Cap Spacing
Franchises need to free up cap space at the right times. Miami was brilliant prior to the summer of 2010. They freed up so much cap space that they could offer James and Bosh big contracts (even though not max) to team with Wade. Detroit, conversely, wasn’t in 2009 when it opted to free up space in a year when the best it can do was get Ben Gordon and Charlie Villanueva.
This has nothing to do with market or how much money is in the owners wallets.
3) Possessing “Assets” to acquire stars via trade
It’s exactly what Boston did to get Kevin Garnett and, although a more extreme case, what the Lakers did to get Pau Gasol. The Celtics had a young chip in Al Jefferson and a big expiring contract (Ratliff) that was attractive enough for the Wolves to make the deal.
It’s just coincidence that the team who was able to get KG was Boston (a big market), but it could have easily been a different team if they had the right assets.
Let’s really look at this closely and we will see that market size has very little to do with doing well on the court. The Spurs won four NBA championships because David Robinson got hurt in 1997 and they ended up with the No. 1 pick to get Duncan.
Winning in the NBA is not rocket science, just playing it smart and being lucky.
Showtime: do you really think Lebron and Wade negotiated shorter contracts with Clev and Miami without having discussed playing together at some point? Do you really think Chris Paul has not indicated his interest in playing with Melo in NY?
The owners are attempting to put in a system that will help prevent mini all star teams from popping up in a handful of cities (NY, LA, Boston, Chicago, Miami) at the expense of other teams that don’t have the resources or player interest to develop such a team.
Check out Barkley’s intereview with James Brown and he makes those points in clear terms.
Showtime seems very on point…..
Any player can say they “want” to play for any team. But, a some instances, it just isn’t possible based on the system. Sure, LeBron and Wade talked about playing together because they knew it was a possibility. And the same for Melo and Paul.
But the fact of the matter is, the Knicks will only be able to get Paul if they remain well under the cap to be able to offer him a deal. If the NBA had the MLB system, LeBron and Paul could have talked about going to play with Kobe in LA or with Dwight in Orlando or any other team. But those teams have not had and wont have cap space to be in consideration of getting those guys.
Showtime seemed on point because it’s not like those big city teams like NY and Chicago are dominating every year. They were terrible for so many years and did some manueavering to get under the cap. For the Bulls, they just simply got lucky in the draft to get Rose.
Hunter’s not in the same position because it’s Stern’s positional intransigence that’s making it impossible to bring a reasonable deal back to the players.
I think the last point from Hunter is really starting to become clear. Stern really doesn’t have much influence over a lot of his owners. I’m starting to get the sense that he’d have made a reasonable deal months ago if it weren’t for the hardliners who would drg everybody down to get what they want.
The stupidest thing about this is that small market teams are losing players because the Boston-LA arms race made it clear that younger stars were going to have to join forces to compete. And those teams *never* would have happened if max salaries weren’t artificially making it easier to stack teams with stars.
The current luxury tax works pretty well. The salary cap, actually, is what makes it work best — the Knicks couldn’t get anyone that teams didn’t want to get rid of via trade throughout the entire Isiah Thomas era. The real turning point was when lots of top teams cleared cap space for Lebron. That let big market teams press their competitive advantages when otherwise, GMs would be loathe to enact a plan that involved losing over a period of years.
No way Melo and Amare would have ended up on the Knicks if Donnie Walsh hadn’t cleared cap space to bring in Lebron +1. No team would take a risk like that for a player like STAT (for whom the Cavs would not trade JJ Hickson). But once the Knicks had space to bring in two stars??
That meant two other teams were going to lose significant parts of their team — this time, it was the Suns and the Nuggets.
It all comes back to the max contract artificial portability of NBA stars — something the owners *demanded.*
Hunter and Stern are the same. Stern can’t make a deal because the hardliner owners are controlling these meetings. There is a divide between the hardliners and the big market owners who just want to play with the hardliners winning. Stern has not done enough to unite these groups. Same with Hunter and the players. There are a lot of players who are ready to take the deal and start playing and a group of hardline players, led by agents, who think the players have given up way too much and are pushing decertification. Hunter has done nothing to unite these players. With neither Hunter nor Stern being able to unite their constituents it seems unlikely they will be able to negotiate and reach a deal today, but for some reason I am slightly more optimistic today than I have been for a while. Maybe we’ll get some good news today and we can stop arguing about CBA negotiations and get back to basketball.
Confused why anyone is surprised. Franchises from Cleveland, Toronto, Utah, New Orleans, Denver, Charlotte, and Orlando saw their star players either leave or discuss leaving and the players all but colluded with each other to form “dream teams.”
The small market owners are trying to regain some control over this process and trying to maintain some ability to remain competitive going forward. That is why they are trying to limit the ability of tax paying teams to acquire players.
These players are fools.
If the owners blow away this season because the players will not agree to their terms, there are a lot of players that will lose in the end.
Aside from all the 2011 free agents, you will have 2012 free agents and not one, but 2 rookie classes. 60 of which are guaranteed deals.
That is 60 of 420 jobs taken by rookies. Then factor in about 150 existing contracts that will be in effect for 2012, after having subtracted the amnesty cuts. Plus a third of those existing contracts are on rookie contracts. That will leave a huge free agent group. That is a bad thing for players. A large supply of players will drive down the cost and some players will take under valued contracts to grab the available money. Plus, all the big money will dry up quickly, given to the marquee players. Plus, with so many teams under the cap, not many teams will be able to take advantage of the MLE. Many veterans and role players will be left with minimum contracts and out of jobs!!!!
Why is no reporter writing about that? The only people this holdout by the players favors are the marquee players, the ones making the most money.
For example, on a minimum contract, annual raises are in the thousands, whether 3.5%, 5%, 8% or 10.5%. Over the course of a 5 year deal, that maybe amounts to a 500K difference. For an MLE, over 4 years, nearly 2 million. For a max contract, over 5 years, over 5 million difference.
Also, tax paying teams already have significant players and salaries on their team. What is the motivation to want tax paying teams to be able to sign full MLEs and do sign and trades? To help drive up demand for lesser players.
From a league standpoint I like this wrinkle. This means that a player won’t automatically go to a contender or big market team that just throws the max MLE at them.
This allows the smaller market/non-tax paying teams to offer more than the bigger market over tax teams to get mid-level talent at a good price, helping more teams gain and retain quality talent on decent contracts.
Furthermore, this tells me that the NBA owners are concerned about the game, which is the product. While the players, “who are the product” (as many of them have said in negotiations), are more concerned with maintaining ways to retain market conditions that encourage overspending and overvaluing of free agents, which actually is detrimental to “the game”.
Hunter ought to know, he’s in the exact same position.