Strike! Strike! Strike!

As the dust settles....I just hope that if the saleries are lowered that the FANS can catch a break to with somewhat lower ticket prices.

I do agree that some teams need to go under and perhaps a shortening of the season a bit too. DO we really need 82 games to get a peeking order for the playoffs? Start the season in November and have it finish in March 68 games. 12 teams to a conference 6 to a division. Play own conference 4 times 11 teams 44 games and the other division 2 times 24 games (68 total) Playoffs should be cut down to 3 rounds too. Meaning 8 team make it or perhaps a couple byes for the top teams with 2-4 more teams in.


The quality of the sport would go up tremendously and so to perhaps would college ball at the same time.

beat

dboss,

The CBA did expire on June 30, 2011. The link below is the CBA and at the top of page #2 you will see that it expired on June 30, 2011 and that the NBA had the option of extending the CBA for one year, but declined to do so.

http://www.nba.com/.element/mp3/2.0/sect/podcastmp3/PDF/CBA101.pdf


I don't think less games is even a topic of discussion. The owners want to pay the players less so they can make more money or to become profitable, not to lower the price of the tickets.


I can't see a hard cap working for the following reasons:
1) The players will not agree to it.
2) Nobody has said what teams over the cap would have to do get under the cap. Release a player or two? The NBA will not do something drastic that hurts their premier franchises that are over the salary cap. (Boston/Dallas/LA/Miami, etc)
3) With a hard cap, there would be no 'revenue sharing' like there is today. The owners of the lower revenue teams want MORE revenue sharing, not less or no revenue sharing.

dboss,

The link I provided is the NBA's actual CBA.
This is not an interpretation.

I do agree that the owners are the ones locking out the players and they are the ones that let the CBA expire without renewing it.

The high salaries and the bad contracts are not the players fault. The owners complain about losing money then fight over who will give the largest contract to mediocre players. The owners are looking to get bailed out from their own poor decisions. The owners and players both have valid points to their arguments, they just need to meet somewhere near the middle and do so quickly. I think the players will have to give in more, like the NHL players did in 2005. The NHL players regret not doing so earlier. I think the NBA players union will learn from what the NHL players went through.

The collective bargaining agreement (CBA) will be one tough onion to negotiate. About the only thing guaranteed is the crying.

I happen to like Mark Heisler of the LA Times. He is knowledgeable, fair, and (in my opinion) fun to read. Here's his take on the current state of affairs.

http://www.latimes.com/sports/la-sp-heisler-nba-labor-20110701,0,4123160,full.column

It's hard to say what the NBA owners finances are. They keep including payments on debt incurred to purchase a team in their expenses. Yes, that's part of their expenses, but is it the players' fault that owners borrowed a bunch of money to buy the team? Who knows what else they're including on the catastrophe side of their financial ledger. Different sport (and epically bad owner), but it's been illuminating to see how Frank and Jamie McCourt robbed the Dodgers to the point of financial ruin. We have no way of knowing if any NBA owners take money from their franchise for their own benefit and then call that "an expense," but that sounds right up Donald Sterling's alley.

Still, I agree with owners that things need to change. For example:

-- Guaranteed contracts. Consider Rashard Lewis, Gilbert Arenas, and Michael Redd. Signing players is a crapshoot. Sometimes players turn out to be fool's gold (Lewis), clueless and/or self-destructing (Arenas), or the unlucky recipient of shredded body parts (Redd). In each case, a team is saddled with huge contracts for a player who doesn't or can't perform. As a self-employed independent contractor, I need to perform to fulfill the terms of my contract and receive the agreed-upon compensation. Conversely, if I don't perform, my customer will terminate my contract and pay only for the work done to date. Athletics is different, but I do believe teams should get relief for players who don't perform. In the case of injury, how about paying 50% of the contract while the player is out? It would be tough to come up with a fair way to do that for players like Lewis who just don't perform to the level of their contract. Players could get contract insurance to cover injury or non-performance, but there are scenarios like players coming back too soon so they get paid or management telling players they're not ready so they don't have to pay the full contract. While it might not be as tough as a Middle East peace agreement, it would be tricky, but I think it needs to be addressed in some way.

-- Length of contracts. Contracts are too long, and there's too much risk to the team with long contracts. There is also benefit to the team in securing a player's services for a longer period and not having to renegotiate more often or potentially lose a player to free agency, but I'm generally in favor of shorter contracts. This would help address the prior point (underperforming/injured players) as well.

-- Revenue sharing. This is the small market / big market conundrum. For ideal health, the league needs all franchises, in both small and big markets, to be financially sound and competitive. It's fine for large-market teams to have some advantage, because large-market teams doing well is good for ratings, but the current situation is more like small-market pilot fish living off scraps of large-market sharks than a level playing field. Large-market teams have a huge advantage financially because of local TV contracts and higher ticket prices and ancillary revenue, which is why large-market teams have been able to go way over the salary cap, take the luxury tax hit, and still come out way ahead. Small-market teams can't compete for top players in direct compensation, and large-market teams have the additional advantage that players have much greater outside income opportunities (sponsorship and advertising deals in large markets dwarf what a player can earn being spokesman for Main Street Motors in Milwaukee).

To illustrate the disparity in operating models, here is some of the most recent Forbes data (2009-2010) for the Knicks:

Revenue - $226 mil
Operating Income - $64.0 mil
Player Expenses - $86 mil
Gate Receipts - $81 mil

Compare that to data for the Bucks:

Revenue - $92 mil
Operating Income - $-2.0 mil
Player Expenses - $69 mil
Gate Receipts - $20 mi

And the trend is for this gulf to get wider. The Lakers signed a 20-year, $3 billion (with a "B") deal with Time-Warner. That works out to $150 million per year, just for their local TV rights. Luxury tax? Just the cost of doing business.

Under the previous CBA, small-market teams could succeed (San Antonio, OKC), but the playing field is hugely skewed to large markets. The only small-market teams who thrive are models of well-run operations. Even inept large-market teams make money (Knicks, Clippers).

Again, not an easy thing to sort out, but the new CBA needs to help small-market teams, and increased revenue-sharing is key. Standing in the way are the big-market haves who like keeping all that money, the big-money stars who like big contracts from glamorous teams and livin' large in the big city, and big-money agents who like getting their piece of all that. Separating them from all that money may involve hostages and a ticking time bomb scenario, but I do think something is going to happen on this front. Not to despair, I think it's good for a team like Boston, which while at the larger end of the scale in market size, is really in a second tier below New York, LA, and Chicago. The more things skew in favor of large market teams, the more teams will separate into levels even more, with Boston at a disadvantage compared to the really big boys and in a medium-market group with teams like Toronto, Houston, and Dallas (Boston actually has a smaller metro population than those cities).

-- Split of basketball-related income between players and owners. Under the previous CBA, the players got 57%, the owners 43%. The league has suggested 45% players, 55% owners. They'll duke it out and come to some sort of compromise eventually. The fact is that players will have to give on this one; the question is, how much.

-- No entourages on the planes, at the practice facilities, or in seats behind the bench. Ever. Families don't greet their loving superstar father/husband/son/whatever on the way to the dressing room or pose with the team. Ever. Since everyone else is making demands about what they want in the CBA, I thought I'd make a couple of demands, too.

There are other issues, but I think those are the big ones. I don't think a shorter season and/or playoffs, contraction (reducing the number of teams), or a completely hard salary cap are practical. Some ideas (especially contraction) are negotiating ploys that allow a side to give the appearance of a concession from a position they had no intention of winning anyway. The players are at the negotiating disadvantage because their "extreme" position that they will have to make concessions from is less than what they had in the last CBA. The leagues "extreme" position is the ultimate destruction of all life on the planet due to the financial hardship of the owners.

One interesting idea that Heisler mentioned was players receiving a stake in ownership if they're expected to help pay for the debt on franchises. Personally, I'm all for anything that would enhance the concept that players and owners are partners in a joint enterprise instead of opponents in a zero-sum game trying to maximize their own piece of the pie by limiting what the other side gets. I'd love to see more creative ideas like that instead of posturing, but I'm not holding my breath. Sometimes these guys seem like idiots who find a goose that lays golden eggs and make foie gras. My guess is that we'll lose some games but have some sort of season. I do agree with Heisler that not much will happen until September.

Outside

dboss,

Some of your recommendations are reasonable, some are not.
Outside of a hard cap, none of your suggestions are a topic of conversation between the players and owners.

I don't know why you want to limit the rookies to $1m/year. The current $1m to $5.3m for 1st round picks is reasonable.

The league does not and will not base their new agreement on each teams profitability. Teams can adjust their books to show or not show a profit. Also, a team can lose money for a number of years and still have an increase in the value of their team. Terminating a team that is not showing a profit is extreme.

As for your suggestion about career ending injuries, very few injuries are career ending. Even the injuries of Grant Hill or Greg Oden were not career ending.

I think both sides have valid points but I feel the players will cave to most of the owners demands.

dboss,

If a team is receiving revenue sharing that only means that they are a lower salaried team for that year, it doesn't mean that they are losing money. Take Cleveland as an example. They will receive revenue sharing but they made a tremendous amount of money this year. They had the 3rd highest attendance in the league and was looking to take on bad contracts to get high draft picks. They traded for Baron Davis and his bloated contract so they could get the Clippers 1st round draft pick which wound up being the #1 pick.

There are only 30 rookies that make $1m or more each year. That is not unreasonable.

I agree that failing franchises should be allowed to fail, if they are a hopeless failure, not just going through a bad stretch or if their owners have lost significant money in other business ventures. (The Maloofs).

I don't think they will miss 1 game. When they do agree, I will buy the League Pass again.

Interesting discussion, thanx all. Here are a few for consideration.

1. Change the name of the thread to Lockout, Lockout, Lockout. It's a lockout, not a strike. Just the first example of why the owners are at fault here.
2. Whether or not the CBA was terminated or allowed to expire the reality is the owners are forcing a renegotiation of the CBA in order to increase their profits at the players expense. This is Union busting, just part of a growing national trend to hurt working people so the rich can get richer.
3. All of the fault is with the owners. The players either sign for what is offered or have to look elsewhere. Who wouldn't accept more money or negotiate for the best deal.
4. The real problem, of course is the runaway greed of all parties but especially the owners. Remember it really isn't all about the Benjamins. Alot of this is ego, to say you are one of the elite, the owners. To say you get paid more than others, and ever increasingly your teamates.
5. Fans will NEVER catch a break. Remember, you not only get raped for the ticket price but for the concessions as well. But it goes much further than this. How much more do you pay for a sixpack now because Bud and Miller pay such high advdertising costs?
6. What can a fan do? Sacrifice I made the decision last year to NOT renew NBA League Pass. I let NBA know I was not going to pay that much. Contact sponsors and object to the price of the product and the % that goes to advertising on sports programming. It really won't do any good but you can do it. Who knows what might happen if more and more people were willing to sacrifice instant gratification for real $ savings in there bank account?
7. We need to wake up to the larger implications. We have runaway corporate greed devastating all aspects of our lives, from guvmint, to sports, to the price we pay at the pump and for our denatured, not healthy anymore, food. This is hardly counterbalanced by people being willing to get paid much more than they are worth be it for playing sports or being a hedgfund manager or corporation ceo.
8. We are confronted by a mixture of corporate capitalism and socialism in all aspects of our life. What else is revenue sharing but socialism? The key is striking a balance of these two diametricaly opposed philosophies. It will take an intellect greater than David Sterns to make this right. After all the guy can't even hire competent Refs. LOL
9. Until or unless the owners provide full disclosure on finances, we wiill not have the facts to assess this situation properly. And yes, the fans/media should have this info available. We finance the NBA thru ticket/concession purchases, League Pass, clothing etc.
10. We need to better fully understand the implications of contraction on the economy of the cities in question. How many other business go under because of the subtraction of those millions of dollars from the local economy. We are in hard economic times and all things must be taken into acount.

Lockout! Lockout! Lockout! There’s no doubt this is the owners doing. They can’t control their spending and they want the players to pay for their poor judgement. If it goes on for too long, the players are going to hurt at first, but eventually some teams are bound to fold. Fewer teams means fewer jobs for players but also fewer sources to meet the league’s obligations. The whole thing could spiral out of control. Not a pretty story.

The worst part of all this is, there are no ready or easy solutions. Both sides are strong-willed and determined. It’s a battle of millionaires and there are hundreds of millions at stake. Nobody’s thinking outside the box; there’s panic on David Stern’s face; and it already may be getting too tight to think inside the box.

This is a subject that extends beyond basketball, so it wouldn’t hurt to look elsewhere for solutions. Greece is in the headlines. In ancient Athens, Olympic winners were awarded, among other things, with a roof over their heads and a place at the community meal – for life.

So here’s one off the wall suggestion: have the league pay into a fund for the care and sustenance of former NBA players for life. Not individual cash payments, something else, a large building, with multiple functions, including a food pantry and a public kitchen, (as of two years ago, more than twenty-five percent of children in America had hunger issues). It would be not only a place where former players can stay but also an institution that players can share with all and that connects and commits them to the community in the best possible way. They could have one in each NBA city. Instead of worrying about lining their own pockets with as much as they can get their hands on right this minute, they could provide for the future in a way that distributes a piece of their ridiculously big pie to help everyone. Likely to happen? Ah well, one is still allowed to dream.

Nevertheless, existing institutions are hopelessly outmoded. Take the public school system, please. Our institutions exist to provide solutions for a different time. Just the past ten years have seen incredible, improbable changes in so many areas. The Internet alone has profoundly changed our way of life.

More than anything else, there’s an indisputable demand to build new institutions that organize communities, that reach out both to those who have and to those in need, institutions that are made to include everyone. The NBA Players Association has been a trend setter from the start, thanks mostly to the efforts of Bob Cousy, Tom Heinsohn and the founder of the Celtics, Walter Brown.

Players and owners working together, what they can accomplish is unlimited. Right now they are completely at odds over numbers that are bound to be changing, dwindling, next year and the year after that. It’s a stupendous waste.

Owners and players need to see beyond their own problems, to recognize that their communities are depending on them to set an example. Knowing some of the history of capitalism, though, both sides are going to lose and the players are going to have to give up the most. Then, there’s the lumpen proletariat, the fans; we’re just part of the pie.