I blame Wade for telling the players to not settle less than 53% BRI

After a year of record revenue and interest, the players should give up over 10% of their salaries because of some of the slimiest, shadiest accounting tricks since Enron?

Nah.

 

So is Enron the new talking point, because the word seems to be popping up all over the board?

Bottom line, I don't care if NBA owners are slime balls, because as long as the league has guaranteed contracts and free agency, players will continue to abuse the system, and while I don't feel sorry for bad owners, no way will I ever accept the players being the good guys in this.

 

I wholeheartedly support this post. This Enron crap is starting to really piss me off. That is an entirely different issue.

 

Looks like the Heat aren't winning a championship again next year (or the year next)

 

Players have the best average salaries in sports, and the biggest issue is that they aren't held accountable. In any job, if you stop performing, if you lose motivation, if you start half assing it, or you are disrespectful to your boss or colleagues, you can breach your contract. In the NBA, the Tj fords, Allen iversons, eddy curry, tinsley, jjerome james, eric dampiers can just decide to start mailing it in, or demand a starting spot, go against the team or coach ,do whatever they want and there is no accountability, they still have guaranteed millions. '

It is the most ridiculous thing. Owners have made dumb decisions, but the lack of accountability with the players and their guaranteed millions is just absurd. Now they have the audacity to want the cushion they got in a prime market and threaten to 'goto europe' and crap like that. Go there see the lack of marketing, professionalism, infrastructure(doctors,planes, tv deals) that the NBA has built up over the years and just get real. The nba underpays superstars(kobe,bron,wade,etc) who are the only people who put seats and sell jerseys and then the rest are more or less overpayed and they are the ones fighting for the ridiculous deals at this point.

 

There's so much propaganda on both sides (and with the journalists too) that it all doesn't matter. They need to get real and stop using those lame, drawn out negotiation tactics.

 

So if a dude has a career ending injury, he should just be thrown under the buss? Or if the owner is dumb enough to sign Eddie Curry to a giant contract, that's the whole union's fault?

Siding with the owners is siding with dishonest talking points and dirty accounting tricks.

 

Just cancel the season. Who needs the NBA! The owners have been setting themselves up for this salvo against the players for half a decade now, I'm glad the players actually have the guts to take the hit this time around. Basketball's an international sport now, so I find it highly intriguing to see how some players are going to be faring overseas. I don't want a restart of the NBA to ruin all this CHAOS.

Best case scenario: the players find international waters to be more hospitable than expected, return to the US with a renewed vigor to attempt to start a league without the NBA ownership involved, and in an act of desperation the owners dethrone David Stern. All the financial issues aside, this is the best case scenario because DAVID STERN WOULD BE GONE.

Who turned the NBA into a no-handchecks league?
Who effectively eliminated the big man in the low post?
Who rigs the draft lotto each year?
Who takes on personal agendas against his perceived enemies and has the officiating under his thumb?

Yep. Same guy. And basketball in America will always be the least legitimate of the major sports here until someone new takes over.

 

Dood, the NBA will still be the same with or without Stern. If he steps down, the next in line would be Stern's b*stard son, Adam Silver.

 

It works on players.

 

Being against guaranteed long term contracts is not siding with dishonest talking points and dirty accounting tricks. Players could get signing bonuses just like they do in the NFL. I won't feel the least bit sorry for a player that gets a $20MM guaranteed signing bonus and then has a career ending injury and gets cut. Those big long term contracts are no good for the game. They just force teams to be bad for long periods of time. The NBA needs to get rid of guaranteed six year contracts and go to a system more like the NFL. If you don't perform or get hurt you get cut.

 

Everybody's a crook!

 

Could someone smarter than me (or w more free time) please calculate
the difference between 3% in BRI and losing 10 & 30 games in a season?

I feel like it's a moot point at this juncture.

Players should just "forfeit" the 3% and say that owners have to invest it
back into their communities.
Everyone wins.

 

This made me chuckle.

 

That you suggest someone who ceases to be productive should still continue to be paid to do nothing, is only made the more laughable by the volume of money we're talking about.

Employment safety nets aren't really designed for the guys on CEO level salaries...

 

The reason enron is briught up so much is because the owners are using shady accounting to manufacture the appearance of losing money.

DD

 

NBA also have caps on their salaries. The top .001% of any profession is gong to get paid. LeBron was worth 100 million to the cavs but did he get paid like that? The NFL is not like that. It doesn't take the same skill level except for qbs and they get paid.

 

I don't buy into the "the perception of the league will suffer" argument. Sure there will be fans who are turned off, and if the economy is still bad in a year, there certainly will be fewer season ticket holders.

But television ratings will still be high. Remember that when the league finally resumed in '99 it was right after Jordan retired and right before Phil-Kobe-Shaq started rolling.

Unlike '99, the current NBA (whenever it does resume) still has the Heat and competitive teams with star players in New York, Boston, and Los Angeles.

The league will be fine.

 

* and Chicago.