I can just as easily say the owners don't give two ****s about the players, they just want their money. I'm not taking sides, but knote brings up a good point. You're saying these players won the DNA lottery. Well, usually people who win that lottery (actors, great thinkers, and good musicians) are set for life. What makes NBA players any different? MLB players get paid a lot. Soccer players make a lot. It's the brute sports like hockey, football, and lacrosse where players don't make nearly as much. Boxing is the exception because it's one-on-one without any headgear. What the players did wrong is they kept caving too easily. They let the pressure get the best of them. The owners are just waiting to see how much they can squeeze out of them now. If they try to drag this out, 47% is no joke.
Are they worth 5yr 33 mil? Nobody is denying they have a role on their team but is the return worth the money they got paid?? Come on man
The owners want a league in which the franchises can surivive so they can sell them later for a profit, you don't think they watched George Shin lose his ass on a franchise? And Gilbert lost about $200 million in value when LeBron left....yes, they want to change the system so that everyone has a chance to compete. For the good of us fans and workers at the stadium, I want a deal that protects the game.....not the players lifestyles. DD
KG was the guy who ruined one of the meetings, IIRC. He couldn't keep his emotions in check. He was the Union's "Paul Allen". I would love for the Shane Battier's and Grant Hill's of the NBA stand up and speak.
How many $ did the Cavs owner gain when they won the lottery and got to draft Lebron? How many free $ did Donald Sterling gain because he got to draft Blake Griffin? How many $ did Les Alexander gain when he won the Yao Ming lottery?
TommyBeer Tommy Beer FWIW, Stephen A Smith reported on ESPN radio that Fisher and Kobe are willing to accept 50%, while other players (KG & Pierce) would not Stephen A. Reporting some meaty stuff.
Who cares. Owners are greedy. I don't give a ****. I don't see what options the players really have. They really do not have any leverage. Things will only get worse for them. The owners will win, fix the issues, and ultimately profit. At the end of the day, the players will still make millions of dollars to play basketball. I don't know if pride or just foolishness is driving the NBPA to continue. The only thing that I saw you do is take a moral approach against the owners. There is no room for emotions here. So far emotions and morality are the only things I have heard from anyone supporting players. If there is nothing of tangible meaning in your argument, why even speak at all?
It's probably not a good idea to have the guy who just lost LeBron James leading the negotiations. Poor management on the Cavs organization is to blame. Bringing in guys well past their prime like Shaq, and Antawn Jamison is probably what caused LeBron to leave that situation. Overpaying for Mo Williams wasn't too smart either.
LeBron was basically the GM of the Cavs during the last 3 or 4 seasons on the team. It didn't help though that Gilbert basically powdered LeBron's ass and let him do what he wanted.
Every owner of every business in the world wants that. It simply isn't reality, and I daresay that most owners are out of their element If they are running an NBA franchise for profit. Regardless, it is very possible for a franchise to survive and make a profit, and it doesn't require the BRI to be anywhere near 50 percent. "I'm Robert Sarver! I have Amare Stoudamire, a superstar! I am going to let him go and give his massive salary to Josh Childress and Hakim Warrick! Oh wait, It's the system that's broken! I was bamboozled, hoodwinked, LED ASTRAY!!!" For the good of us fans and workers at the stadium, I want a deal that protects the game.....not the owner's lifestyles.
Good management recognizes a player has no excuse to leave if his team is making progress. They should have been patient and made sure the Cavs were at their best before LeBron could pack his bags. Kobe was unhappy, but the Lakers were patient, made the right moves, and he signed an extension.
What is protecting the game? Watching owners after managers commit blunder after blunder and then they get to cry about how the system is unfair to them, and so the rights of the players need to be restricted because the owners are too stupid to know better? The players have offered to give back, and the owners are just going "lol no." Sure, they have leverage. That doesn't mean I'm going to like what they're doing, and I definitely won't buy their crap that somehow the purity of the game will be preserved if we can force a player to play on one team for his entire career.
You and me both. I've become a little let down with the intelligence of this board as a whole. I challenge anyone who is siding with players on this issue to give me a concrete answer as to why the players are correct in their thinking and actions, without the use of the word "fair" or any moral or emotional implications that go with it.
Wouldn't you agree that say, limiting the effectiveness of guaranteed contracts in one way or other would help minimize "blunders" of management, and the league as a whole to recover? Management is never perfect. Especially when players become injured or unmotivated after being signed, in turn, crippling an organization due to the structure of current contracts in the NBA. The owners don't care if you like how they are negotiating. Agan, the issue of fairness is completely irrelevant. Please think a little harder.
