[CBA Circumvention Article] Question(s) for Bima or any attorney that can decipher legal docs

Here's another scenario for you:

1. Suppose we trade Jeremy Lin and Greg Smith to Indiana for Danny Granger today. Then after the July Moratorium we trade Danny Granger for Zach Randolph. We used the 150% rule to step up and get Granger. Then we used the +$5 million rule to flip Granger for Zach. Is this circumvention?

2. What if we wait two months after getting Granger and then we combine him with another guy, say James Anderson, and trade for Pau Gasol? Is that circumvention?


For each question, show me in Article XIII where it is circumvention.

 

Soooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooo, I have another scenario for you.

Today, rumor started early that DeMarcus Cousins through his agent, the venerable Dan Fegan, was going to demand a 5-year maximum salary extension from the Kings or demand to be traded. It goes without saying that if he doesn't get his way he's gonna piss, pout, and moan and basically destroy that team next season. He's basically done that for the first 3 years of his professional career. But I digress. He's going to try to force his way out of Sacramento if they do not give into his request for a maximum 5-yr deal so he can then be traded to a team in time to sign a 5-yr extension this Summer.

In my opinion, this is blatent circumvention.

Why??? Because he's not willing to abide by the CBA and go through the restricted free agency process and possibly wind up with a 4-yr deal with lower raises. He's trying to force a team to give him a 5-yr max deal with max raises.

In my opinion this is an obvious case of attempted circumvention by player and agent. If Fegan actually goes through with this rumored threat, both him and Cousins should be fined and suspended. And if they go through with this rumored threat and they are not fined and/suspended after watching this debacle of how the league is sniffing through every hair of the Doc/KG/DeAndre and company trade then I can say no less than the league office is totally hypocritical in their interpretation of the CBA.

What say you?

 

So, it's not circumvention for a player and agent to put pressure on a team and demand a trade so they can get more money than they otherwise wouldn't get?????

 

Aleron, that is circumvention man. That's exactly what Minnesota did to Joe Smith.

 

They got him to take less money, Aleron.

 

Here's another scenario for your consideration:

Note: I'm not putting these questions up here because I'm trying to be a jerk. I'm putting these questions up here because I simply don't know and I feel these questions are going to lead to a serious problem in the league in 3 years. In my opinion, the verbage of Article XIII is so generic it could be interpreted a hundred different ways. I have a strong opinion about this subject however because I think I understand on a deeper level what the owners and players intended when they agreed to the CBA. And my instincts tell me that the league office is going to cause trouble between the players and owners and cause another work stoppage 3 years from now if they continue to meddle too much in these transactions. And I really don't want to see that happen.

In my opinion, the league office is in danger of becoming the same menace off-the-court that the officials became on-the-court several years ago. The officials were throwing their weight around so much, whistling technicals over all sorts of stupid nonsense like players looking at them, players touching them on the shoulder in a friendly gesture to speak to them, not allowing the players to even speak to them during games for clarification on rules and calls, etc., that they became the focal point of the games instead of the teams playing the game.

In my opinion, the league office is in danger of doing the same thing here, becoming the focal point of player movement rather than the team front offices who are working their tails off to build their teams under all the trade and salary cap constraints that they have to work with already without this huge albatross arbitrary "thing" hanging over their heads that the league can shut down their dealings at any moment and penalize them for even talking.

I think the league is taking the whole circumvention verbage way out of bounds and doing things that neither the players nor the teams want them doing. And the reason I keep bringing these different scenarios up is because they are real scenarios that at some point are going to present themselves to the league office in some manner or form. It may not be the exact players or teams but the principles of these different scenarios are going to present themselves to the league office in some manner. Nothing I am suggesting is unrealistic or far-fetched in these trade scenarios. It's all real stuff that has already happened in the league in the past. All I'm doing is putting names and faces and future dates on possible transactions.

Is this really what you want to see from the league office? Do you think this is really what the team owners and GMs want to see the league office doing? Do you think the players want to see the league cracking the whip like this? Some big chief (Stern/Silver) sitting there making judgment calls on what is circumvention and not circumvention, making judgment calls on what is a fair and balanced trade and what isn't? I don't think the teams, the players, nor the fans want to see that. I think the CBA should spell out what is legal and what is not legal in terms of trades and player movement and that should be the end of it.

Even in the penalty phase I think there should be very explicit penalties for breaking the rules. Not judgment call penalties handed out by the commissioner as he is sitting on the commode thinking something up. He shouldn't have that kind of discretion.

And there shouldn't be penalties for teams not breaking the rules because they didn't actually execute a trade but rather talked to the league to find out what would be approved and what would not be approved. That is the purpose of the trade call. Instead the trade call has turned into a risk of penalty for the teams and an opportunity for the league office to squash all the good work of superior front office personnel. Might as well hold a massive draft every year and put all the players in it and have the team with the worst record every year get the first pick until all the guaranteed contracts are drafted. Then start the rookie draft after that. Should teams be penalized for duscussing a transaction with another team without knowing whether the league office thinks that particular transaction is circumvention and then approaching the league and asking the league if the trade is acceptable? Should the league be able to penalize teams for discussing trades but not actually executing them? That's what has happened in the Clips/Celts case. Both teams have been penalized for a year. And they didn't actually execute anything. They went to the league to get approval before they actually did anything. So, for all that, they get penalized by the league for a whole year.

This is why I say the league office is doing the same thing the officials were doing a couple years back, making it difficult to have a friendly relationship with them, making it difficult to play the game the right way because they are interfering. All they are going to do by making judgments and penalties this way is create an even more anti-friendly environment between themselves and the front offices of the teams...which is going to lead to more under-the-table stuff that they can't prove.....which will then lead them to making more "circumstantial" evidence judgments....which will lead to total acrimony between the teams and the league office and between the players' union and the league office. Which means almost certain work stoppage in 3 more years. Once again, I don't like that. That's why I'm talking about it and bringing these scenarios up. There's many, many more scenarios left to bring up too.

 

So, here's my next scenario. (Boy, you guys are so anxious to solve these.)

Let's say that the Mavs decided to waive Dirk yesterday at 11:59 p.m. Teams have 48 hours to make a claim on him. But no one does because nobody in the league has $20 million of open cap space to slide him into nor do they have a traded player exception big enough for him. So, he goes unclaimed and the waiver expires tomorrow night at 11:59 a.m., one minute before July 1, and free agency.

Since this contract was signed under the previous CBA, the Mavs and Dirk agree to stretch that $22 million they owe him over 10 years, thereby spreading the cap hit out to a little over $2 million per season. (If this is not legal, somebody show me. I perused Coon and the CBA on this for limits of stretching but couldn't find any.)

Mavs then sign Dirk to a more reasonable $5 million/season contract. So they've basically cleared about $15 million of extra cap space. Wala. They then sign Dwight and are sitting on about $45 million of salary for 2013/14 with the opportunity to sign Josh Smith (or some other free agent outright), along with having Marion's and Carter's expiring deals to possibly turn into other talent.

Would this be circumvention?????

 

Here's another scenario for you:

<blockquote class="twitter-tweet"><p>Besides Kobe, Nash, Kupchak and Jim Buss, reps from Time Warner will also be in the meeting with Howard Tuesday.</p>&mdash; Ramona Shelburne (@ramonashelburne) <a href="https://twitter.com/ramonashelburne/statuses/351756355528441856">July 1, 2013</a></blockquote>
<script async src="//platform.twitter.com/widgets.js" charset="utf-8"></script>


If this meeting takes place and TWC indeed offers Dwight a show based on him deciding to remain with the Lakers....IS NOT THIS BLATANT CIRCUMVENTION????????????



While we're at it......the Raising Canes chicken finger offer to Dwight.....IS NOT THAT BLATANT CIRCUMVENTION???????

 

Are you saying that from your opinion or are you an attorney and have read Article XIII and surmise based on professional understanding of that language?

 

Here's another scenario for your consideration.

Eric Pincus, a sportswriter in LA, is talking about the possibility of Kobe taking a minimum salary next season thereby allowing the Lakers to sign up at least 2 premier free agents (Lebron and Melo) with the idea being after 2015, the Lakers still have Kobe's birds rights and they can then give him a fresh max deal (~$20 million) that would balance out the minimum salary he took in 2014. If both Kobe and Pau did this.....and there was no agreement by the Lakers to give them that max deal in 2015, Pincus thinks it's not circumvention.

Read Article XIII, specifically the part about circumstantial evidence, and give your opinion. Would this be circumvention??