Since the Jazz are part of this lockout, and because I can, I'm sticking this here. I thought it was a pretty good (and long) read, at least the part where he explains the main sticking points in the whole mess. He then offers his suggestions to fix it, which I'm sure someone with much more knowledge than me can find flaws in the suggestions (or maybe not). I'll link the first few paragraphs here, even though it's from a free site, as (even though I should know) I'm not exactly sure if "we" care for whole long articles to be posted. I'll edit it later if it's permissible.
https://www.nba.com/2011/news/features/david_aldridge/06/20/morning-tip-labor-breakdown/index.html
We're at the 58th minute of the 11th hour.
This is the beginning of the last week that can truly avert an lockout by NBA team owners. They will meet with the players' union Tuesday in New York, a meeting that David Stern indicated last Friday would be make or break. The sides have met three times in full session in the last two weeks, along with a couple of smaller sessions between the lawyers, and Stern and Billy Hunter speak on the phone all the time. Yet here we are, 11 days from a lockout that everyone says will be disastrous for the sport, while everyone seems powerless to stop it from happening.
It doesn't have to be this way.
There's a middle ground.
It will require sacrifice from both sides. It will require trust from both sides. It will require acknowledging that the other side's position has some merit and is worth considering. But it is there.
It will be difficult. Rich men are capable of doing just about anything to remain rich. This new generation of NBA owners, many of whom are leveraged up to their ears and who have tens of millions of annual debt service to pay before they pay a single coach or player their gargantuan salaries, has among its ranks those who are fully ready to sacrifice all of next season if it means a sea change in the league's financial system. The new generation didn't pay $1 million for his franchise (like the late Abe Pollin, who bought the Baltimore Bullets in 1964), or $6 million (the late Bill Davidson, who bought the Pistons in 1974). Having been in the game for decades, the old guard was more likely to be willing to cut a deal.
Today's NBA is filled with owners who paid through the nose for their teams, and have years of red ink in front of them before they ever see a return on their investment.
The list includes Joe Lacob and Peter Guber (Golden State, purchased in 2010 for $450 million), Robert Sarver (Phoenix, 2005, $400 million), Dan Gilbert (Cleveland, 2005, $375 million), Wyc Grousbeck and Steve Pagluica (Boston, 2002, $360 million), Ted Leonsis (Washington, 2010, $300 million -- an estimated price that does not include another $250 million in debt on Verizon Center and the Wizards that Leonsis also has to assume) and Mikhail Prokhorov (New Jersey, 2009, $200 million for 80 percent of the team and 45 percent of the new Barclays Center in Brooklyn in which the Nets will play beginning in 2013).
Add to that NBA owners who also own NHL teams -- a group including Leonsis (Capitals), Stan Kroenke (Nuggets, Colorado Avalanche) and Philip Anschutz (part-owner of the Lakers and owner of the NHL's Kings) and who survived the cancellation of the 2004-05 season in that sport after a lockout lasting nearly a year -- and you have a strong cross-section of owners who are emboldened to do whatever it takes to create a system that ensures profitability. That's something you have heard from Stern and deputy commissioner Adam Silver over and over again during the past 18 months.
"The old guys, they'd made a lot of money already," said a longtime and former senior executive of an NBA team who's been involved in previous collective bargaining sessions with the players. (Like just about everyone quoted in this piece, he obviously cannot be named.).
"Now you have guys saying 'I'm losing money, and I have to find a way to make this team that I bought for $350 million worth $500 million.' "
Players, of course, don't want their paychecks to finance profit certainty when no other business has that kind of arrangement with its workers.
"We've continued to try our best to be respectful and reasonable with, not only our ability to listen to what the NBA owners are asking or demanding from us, but we've also tried to express the fact that we're more than willing to negotiate," National Basketball Players Association president Derek Fisher said during The Finals. "And that we've expressed and actually committed to being willing to make some adjustments, and tweak some things, make some quote-unquote compromises in order to try and get this deal done without the event of a lockout. At the same time, we have a responsibility as a Players Association to prepare our guys for that possibility."
Until Friday, when owners made what they deemed a "signficant" concession and agreed to table a proposal that would have changed the existing NBA structure that allows teams to guarantee part or all of a player's contract -- the union argued that it's hardly a concession to agree to something that's already in the CBA -- there had been almost no major movement between the sides. The issues that have been impeding progress for 18 months continue to be daunting.
(rest on link...the article is too long for me to post all of it with our software)
https://www.nba.com/2011/news/features/david_aldridge/06/20/morning-tip-labor-breakdown/index.html
We're at the 58th minute of the 11th hour.
This is the beginning of the last week that can truly avert an lockout by NBA team owners. They will meet with the players' union Tuesday in New York, a meeting that David Stern indicated last Friday would be make or break. The sides have met three times in full session in the last two weeks, along with a couple of smaller sessions between the lawyers, and Stern and Billy Hunter speak on the phone all the time. Yet here we are, 11 days from a lockout that everyone says will be disastrous for the sport, while everyone seems powerless to stop it from happening.
It doesn't have to be this way.
There's a middle ground.
It will require sacrifice from both sides. It will require trust from both sides. It will require acknowledging that the other side's position has some merit and is worth considering. But it is there.
It will be difficult. Rich men are capable of doing just about anything to remain rich. This new generation of NBA owners, many of whom are leveraged up to their ears and who have tens of millions of annual debt service to pay before they pay a single coach or player their gargantuan salaries, has among its ranks those who are fully ready to sacrifice all of next season if it means a sea change in the league's financial system. The new generation didn't pay $1 million for his franchise (like the late Abe Pollin, who bought the Baltimore Bullets in 1964), or $6 million (the late Bill Davidson, who bought the Pistons in 1974). Having been in the game for decades, the old guard was more likely to be willing to cut a deal.
Today's NBA is filled with owners who paid through the nose for their teams, and have years of red ink in front of them before they ever see a return on their investment.
The list includes Joe Lacob and Peter Guber (Golden State, purchased in 2010 for $450 million), Robert Sarver (Phoenix, 2005, $400 million), Dan Gilbert (Cleveland, 2005, $375 million), Wyc Grousbeck and Steve Pagluica (Boston, 2002, $360 million), Ted Leonsis (Washington, 2010, $300 million -- an estimated price that does not include another $250 million in debt on Verizon Center and the Wizards that Leonsis also has to assume) and Mikhail Prokhorov (New Jersey, 2009, $200 million for 80 percent of the team and 45 percent of the new Barclays Center in Brooklyn in which the Nets will play beginning in 2013).
Add to that NBA owners who also own NHL teams -- a group including Leonsis (Capitals), Stan Kroenke (Nuggets, Colorado Avalanche) and Philip Anschutz (part-owner of the Lakers and owner of the NHL's Kings) and who survived the cancellation of the 2004-05 season in that sport after a lockout lasting nearly a year -- and you have a strong cross-section of owners who are emboldened to do whatever it takes to create a system that ensures profitability. That's something you have heard from Stern and deputy commissioner Adam Silver over and over again during the past 18 months.
"The old guys, they'd made a lot of money already," said a longtime and former senior executive of an NBA team who's been involved in previous collective bargaining sessions with the players. (Like just about everyone quoted in this piece, he obviously cannot be named.).
"Now you have guys saying 'I'm losing money, and I have to find a way to make this team that I bought for $350 million worth $500 million.' "
Players, of course, don't want their paychecks to finance profit certainty when no other business has that kind of arrangement with its workers.
"We've continued to try our best to be respectful and reasonable with, not only our ability to listen to what the NBA owners are asking or demanding from us, but we've also tried to express the fact that we're more than willing to negotiate," National Basketball Players Association president Derek Fisher said during The Finals. "And that we've expressed and actually committed to being willing to make some adjustments, and tweak some things, make some quote-unquote compromises in order to try and get this deal done without the event of a lockout. At the same time, we have a responsibility as a Players Association to prepare our guys for that possibility."
Until Friday, when owners made what they deemed a "signficant" concession and agreed to table a proposal that would have changed the existing NBA structure that allows teams to guarantee part or all of a player's contract -- the union argued that it's hardly a concession to agree to something that's already in the CBA -- there had been almost no major movement between the sides. The issues that have been impeding progress for 18 months continue to be daunting.
(rest on link...the article is too long for me to post all of it with our software)
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