Derek Fisher's letter to players - Talks about lockout status and situation

You can't measure it just by who wins championships. Season to season competitiveness is what counts.

 

I wonder how many times he fell over while writing this

 

Derek Fisher sucks.

 

Derek Fisher is a good Union rep.

 

Billy Hunter was on SAS's radio show and basically said he expected things to be resolved within 2 weeks. If you don't want to listen to the whole 13 mins, skip ahead to about the 12 min mark. This is the most optimistic he's ever sounded.

http://espn.go.com/nba/story/_/id/6975352/nba-lockout-players-owners-declare-unity-separate-meetings

 

Friday Donuts: 12 NBA Lockout Observations

http://mavericks.scout.com/2/1107195.html

Some quotes:

DONUT 2: Which side is “fractured’’? And ultimately, who cares? I know which side is fractured. It’s the side trying to get 450 men to think together … a more difficult task than trying to get 30 men to think together.


DONUT 5: Ultimately, though, fans don’t care which side gives in. Just that one side does. And right now, the “side’’ unwilling to cave is the third side, the most muscular agents. The power grab by those agents is on the horizon. If they get their wish for union decertification, Hunter is dead … and both sides will go tell it to a judge. I’m not buying the potential benefits here, though. That’ll mean a more drawn-out process (surely the season will be lost). And history tells us that the players will still not get their way.

Hunter says decertification is not a consideration – at least not until after the National Labor Relations Board issues a ruling on the union’s complaint against the NBA.

“Any decisions made in the future will be made by the players standing behind me and their colleagues,” Hunter said. Translation: Hunter is ready to fight the agents.

And which side is it that has “solidarity,’’ again?


DONUT 8: There are two lessons to be learned from the lost NHL season. The NHL killed its 2004-05 season under very similar circumstances. Lesson One to be learned from this: Four of the NBA’s owners are also NHL owners. (Dolan in New York, Leonsis in Washington, Kroenke in Denver and Tannenbaum in Toronto.) I believe they are comfortable with the sacrifice made because that lockout got the NHL’s financial house in order and put in place a salary cap.

If those guys were willing to do it then, they would be willing to do it now.


DONUT 11: Let me ask it again: Where are the superstars in all of this?
Are the superstars wearing those STAND t-shirts, too? But just doing so in the privacy of their own mansions? How is it that the players who are truly the face of the game and could truly be the face of a settlement, one way or another, are suddenly invisible? They couldn't (wouldn't?) take their private jets to Vegas? The Kobes and the LeBrons travel the world like you and I travel to Kroger's ... but they couldn't take a day to demonstrate that true "solidarity'' is something more than a Derek Fisher buzzword?

 

"expected" or "expecting"?

If he expected than he must be a little pessimistic about the season starting on time but if he's expecting than he sounds a lot more optimistic about it starting on time.

 

I don't get the difference between "expecting" and "expected". All I can say is the statement blew SAS away, prompted more questions and Hunter backtracked (slightly). Combined with something he said earlier in the interview, I'd say Hunter expects resolution fairly soon and the worst case is only a few regular season games will be missed.

 

I preface this by saying that this is assuming these people are more or less telling the truth.

So a while ago, Stern and Bill Simmons did a podcast. On it, Stern said that the owners have planned and willing to do a revenue sharing plan to help the small market teams. He said that the problem is that the overall profitability of the league is the problem. As in, revenue sharing doesn't mean jack squat if the overall bottom line for the NBA is in the red.

So if Fisher claims that the owners are the only ones divided, then I assume it means the players have budged enough so the NBA will be making money as a whole. And that the owners are simply trying to figure out how to divide that profit amongst themselves. If this is true, then we likely will see the end of the lockout soon.

As someone who wants a full NBA season, I hope the above really is what has transpired.

 

I read somewhere that Stern allegedly felt the NBPA offer to reduce their share of total revenue from 57% to 52% was fair. Fisher says there are 2 remaining issues:

1. Revenue sharing among the owners

2. The structure of salaries, which was mainly the hardness of the cap. The players union will not accept a hard cap and Stern said the issue was negotiable (even while saying the owners unanimously want it).

If the above is true, an agreement is near.

 

Quickly skim it.

First several paragraphs sounded like a manifesto of the oppressed, serfs. We are talking about a league with highest average salary in the world. :grin:

In the following paragraphs one can sense D.Fish's frustration. What power does he have in the negotiation? Doesn't seem to be whole lot to me. Looks like the agents are bypassing him.