An ongoing disagreement between NBA owners and the players union is threatening the 2011-12 basketball season.
The NBA owners’ demands are consistent with the overall attitude of corporate America. The NBA is a for-profit business and the owners claim they’re losing money. The players association claims the owners are making plenty of money, and they want more of it.
NBA Commissioner David Sterns and players’ union attorney William Hunter are lockup in what some have called rancorous negotiations to avoid a lockout for the 2011-12 season. The owners are claiming they’re hemorrhaging cash and threaten to shut the league down unless the players are willing to play for less. Last year the NBA had the league to take out a loan for $175 million to aid failing teams. Yet the Golden State Warriors, one of the teams that claims it’s losing money, was sold for $450 million last off-season
Another team demanding league-wide player pay cuts and a cash infusion is the Memphis Grizzlies. That team signed its own free agent, Rudy Gay, who has never been an All-Star, to an $80 million contract. Hunter says ”something stinks in Stern-ville.” He claims, “It all makes no sense. Why would someone buy these franchises if they’re losing this type of money?”
The owners secretly agreed amongst themselves last summer to shorter contracts for less money. The Miami Heat’s rebellious owner, Mickey Arison, couldn’t resist and jumped ship with the financial prospect of what can be in South Beach, still apoplectic over what happen next. Do the namesWade, Bosh and Lebron ring a bell?
Sports writer Howard Bryant says this act was the most “revolutionary” move in the history of the NBA. The Heat turned the table on the ownership and in one summer week completely changed the balance of power in the NBA
The owners say they don’t want players to time their contracts expiration to end at the same time, to concurrently join and create super teams. Whether or not this works in Miami will determine a great deal about the future of the NBA.
Owners are simultaneously furious about the LeBron/DWade/Bosh troika while fighting for a collective bargaining agreement that will absolutely ensure similar scenarios down the road.
The pattern we have grown accustomed to over the years is a rookie deal, 5-7 years max contracts, followed by free agency in the twilight of a career, more players will be free and clear to go where they want right in the middle of their basketball prime.
The NBA can’t have it both ways. Less guaranteed years will mean more freedom. And we saw this summer what players will do if you give them enough freedom.
Owners must decide if they want a league built on foundations of stability and star players dispersed throughout the league, or do they want star players playing fantasy sports with themselves and creating their own mini All-Star teams to compete against the Heat?
There are 30 NBA teams split into two Conferences, Eastern and Western. Twenty-four of the teams operated within their projected budgets.
One team is league-subsidized under an agreement of three years ago: the Washington Wizards. They’re due to reach operating solvency in 2012.
All 24 teams that operated within their budgets also made a modest gain in revenues averaging six percent for the 2009-10 season.
New Jersey was in NBA receivership until last year when Russian billionaire Mikhail Prokhorov bought the franchise for what some experts says was millions over its estimated value.
Of the six teams that received a cash stimulus from the NBA or/and owners association, all but one signed multi-million dollar free-agents this last off-season.
