Franchise tag is stupid. It is an idiotic faction by a bunch of jealous NBA fans who wish they were the Heat. The drafting teams already have a bug advantage in resigning players. Why do players need to be shackled to one organization their entire career? Re: the lockout...yeah, the owners might win the PR battle in the public eye but to do so they have to run down their product which is very stupid.
I actually think that would be a better idea. Allow the max contract to be x% more guaranteed and x% more value allowed. I think the NBA freaked out when players like Sprewell and Houston were getting the contract they were getting, but if you allow a team to only pay one guy that much, you'd see a lot more teams hesitant to leave sooo much money on the table. something like 5 year $90M would be your max with another team but your home team can give you up to a 7 years $190M contract. I think players would think long and hard about joining another team and it actually does take some leverage of the players away in a S&T (the amount of contracts having to take back to match a deal like that will be the trading partner's asset very important).
This is pretty easy to answer...the owners work their PR firms, and the organizations have people dedicated to shaping public perception. Not to mention, the organization's bottom line is not published. If it were, I doubt anyone would be so in favor of the owners......or at least not as much. But as a fan, we just want our better players to stay put...the $$$$$ is sort of irrelevent......because to most of us, it is all too much $$$$ anyway. DD
what stops people from doing that now? the point was if a player wanted to leave his team but couldn't because of the franchise tag he might refuse to play for them, which would basically negate the intentions of a franchise tag (which are to prevent a team from losing its star with no compensation). allowing the team to "tag and trade" him resolves that situation with more leverage in trade talks for the team than with a sign and trade (because the tagged player would then be under contract). if that player is going to pull the same thing at his next location, thats a separate issue.
to be honest, i usually side with owners & the league over the players for a simple reason. i'm an nba fan so i want what's best for the league. and i'm a rockets fan so i want what's best for the team. if i was a tmac-only-fan (remember those? ha) i would want longer term contracts, no max salary, player options and no-trade clauses for every contract. can you imagine what kind of deal tmac would have received from the rockets when they traded for him? we would still be paying him... probably a lot more than $20M a year. as it turns out, the rockets are in a lot better shape because of the rules that favor the owners and the league. sure, the owners make out like bandits. sure they can afford to share the wealth with the players or (gasp) the fans, by dropping ticket prices. but they have a right to make as much as they legally can in an capitalist society. the only thing we can do to protest their profits is stop buying tickets, nba league pass, etc... i'd rather the owners put more money in my pocket than in the players pocket. most of us could use it more than the players can.
Franchise tag is a dumb idea in both football and with this nonsense in basketball. Whatever your line of work, what if they wanted to keep you but you're unhappy because the team is cutting cost and not serious about improving. Why do you have to stay? They have a franchise tag and its called cash out or sign and trade.
I think most fans would still be in the owners' corner even if the bottom lines were published. The owners make a lot more money than the players, but I think most people feel that's the way it should be. It works that way in every other business. The "talent" usually only makes a tiny fraction of what the ownership and top executives make, no matter how indispensable they are to making the business run. The owners are the ones who take the financial risk. And billionaires (or multi-millionaires) willing to buy an NBA franchise are a lot more rare than people willing to play basketball for a living.
a) you have a double standard. Nothing is more anti-capitalist than a salary cap and maximum allowed contract for the engines/producers of the industry's profit (the players). b) The pro sports leagues are supported by taxpayers and get special protections that other industries don't get that allow them to operate without competition. They owners should not be able to use the taxpayers pockets & special antitrust exemptions to maximum profits without accountability--IMO they give up that right with those special protections/exemptions and public sweetheart deals.
i agree, we need a franchise tag badly, and a maximum year version at that. i'm sick of this whole free agency thing. people trying to work where they want for a fair market salary? teams carefully managing themselves to attract that talent? what kind of bull**** is that? if a team drafts you, you play there forever, simple as that. we need loyalty. and that goes both ways. i'm also sick of this whole trading thing. teams managing assets to maximize production? teams coming together and moving players to the benefit of both teams? pure bull****. you draft a person, you keep them forever. i want constant rosters forever. good luck trying to retire. anything to prevent a team that's not mine from getting too much talent or to keep good players from getting paid when another team has the money to pay them. that's over. if there's one thing this offseason has taught me, it's that you overreact to something as much as possible and try to solve it with completely nonsensical solutions if you can.
uhh, duh. because the players aren't us. who cares if stuff is fair to other people! making teams either sign an extension with a guy or trade him for talent during the season or risk losing him for nothing? craziness. just remove the losing him for nothing option. you make that guy who doesn't want to be there, stay there. that really just works out best for everyone. i mean, my goodness, that guy has played for you now. how can he not stay with you forever? it would destroy the league!!!
mcdonalds has the right to dictate salary across its franchises. why not the nba? many companies who franchise retain that right. you could say that the kids who flip the burgers all summer are the producers of that industry. and while i agree they should be getting paid more, its the company's right to dictate salary for its workers. what you call producers, i see as employee's. and if an employee thinks they can find a better job elsewhere, they should seek it out. in the nba players case, there is none better. though some see international leagues as decent alternatives, the vast majority of them understand that the nba is the best company to work for... salary limitations and all. this is some new info to me so i can't really respond until i know more. from what i read, i would agree with you here. in my post which you were responding to, i did mention that if the owners were to give back any more it should be to the fans by making ticket prices more affordable, etc... while i sympathize with the players as workers (im in a union as well), they have it very good considering the work they do. i don't think they honestly deserve it any better. of course, neither do the owners but they still have more of a right to that money than the players. just my opinion.
