Oh, and... "I think our average salary is a couple million dollars a year. You ain't gonna get no sympathy from the fans. They're hard working people - some of them [grin] - and you ain't never gonna get sympathy from the fans."
I don't know man, David Stern crushes his enemies, he's bested Hunter at every turn...and always wins. Look at the NBA, the Luxury Tax, the Salary Cap, restricted free-agency....yeah, basketball salaries are high....but compared to baseball? And when you consider that teams are only 12 players compared to 40-man rosters for football and baseball, NBA stars are cheap. David Stern pretty much gets everything he wants from the union, beats them down...no wonder the owners love him so much.
I am sorry NewYorker, I disagree. I am not saying that the owners/league are "good people" or are any less interested in maximizing their profits than the players are, I am just saying that the Union is clearly not trying their best to avoid a lockout, they have retracted their previous position on certain issues and now ALL of a sudden come back and tell the league, "Oh, you know when we told you that (X) issue is OK? Well, we changed our minds!" That is a bunch of BULL that just tells me, and shows fans, that the Players Union is not really trying hard to avoid the lockout. BTW, NBA athletes are the best payed athletes of all three major sports leagues. For God's sake man, NFL players don't even have guaranteed contracts, and you don't see them pulling off this **** I maintain that the NBA Player's Union is just spoiled, and they are trying to act like lil b****es in these negotiations. Look, I still think that a lockout will be somehow avoided, but it will go down the wire, and the NBAPA will agree to these conditions sooner or later, the owners are not really asking for outrageous concessions here: the two major requests are age limit and to shorten the rediculously long 7-year contracts, which as anyone can tell you are problematic to NBA teams that get stuck with those massive contracts, and end up handicapping a team's cap room to make improvements. (See Webber, Kidd, Houston, etc.) So sorry, but I have zero sympathy for those stupid players.
Basketball has the highest average salary of any sport, including baseball, which has no salary cap, and the strongest players union.
Baseball pays out 60% of it's revenues to players The NFL pays out 56-63% (Labor Agreement). Some say the NHL is near 75% The NBA you ask? 53-57% Not bad... Let's not forget folks that David Stern couldn't deal with the union back in '97...so what did he do? He got big name players like Ewing to decertify the league and basically agree to all of his demands. Masterful.
What is your point? Baseball has 25 man rosters and stadiums that hold more than twice that much. That is no reason for basketball players to make more than baseball players. In addition, half of the drafted rookies in the NBA have 3 year guaranteed contracts for ~3 million per year. Do you think half the players drafted in baseball get deals like that? The point is, NBA players are doing more than fine. All of the owner demands that we have seen in the press are reasonable, and there is no reason for the NBAPA to fight them. If the players don't watch out, they need only to look at the NHL to see what happens when you kill the golden goose. Unions are an archaic remnant of a time that no longer exists. There is too much mobility in the modern world, and too much access to information for workers now to be comparable to workers from the Robber Barron era. If the players were really getting screwed, they would be going over to play in European leagues.
I'm sorry, but I'm just not buying the "you're lucky to making millions, so shut up and take what we give you" argument. Comparing professioinal sports leagues is beyond pointless. The players would like 50 percent of the money generated by the people they bring into arenas, the people who watch the games they play in, and the people who buy the jerseys they sell. And they don't have to sit and watch as the NBA enacts legislation to protect itself from itself. James Dolan signed Allan Houston, the Maloofs signed Chris Webber, and Mark Cuban signed Mike Finley. Nobody put a gun to their head, and the market didn't force them into making horrible deals. Arguing over baseball vs. basketball players relative worth is boneheaded. The Bulls had the third best record in the East this year with four rookies in their eight-man rotation. The third best team in the NL doesn't get that. The players make this money because they're worth this money, and they're under no obligation to sit idly by while the stupid owners work like hell to make up for their myriad mistakes.
I dont know if nba players have it better than mlb players, but its obvious both have it much better than NFL players... The obvious problems for the nba players association is that, most fans shares the owner frustration, views and demands. First the issue of the length of contracts. Obviously fans suffer and thus sympathize with owners when long term GUARUNTEED contracts are awarded to player who at the moment they sign them, either plays like crap (insert mo taylor, tim thomas etc) or gets injured year in and year out (insert allan houston, A. hardaway, etc). Now it may be the owners fault for giving out these contracts, but often times they were good/fair decision at the time. Regardless the point is fans would like to help the owners avoid these crippling situation, because what sadomasochistic fan would want their team to end up like the NY Knicks! Other issues such as minor leagues, age limit, cap increases, drug testing ect... fans seem to be able to more readily relate to the ownership position. Now part of this may be due to the leagues superior p.r. and other such issues, but the major reason is that from what little we know of, the leagues position seems reasonable, rational and fair.
In negotiations, if you agree to accept a condition the other side wants and then take it back the other side will hold out until you give it back. You can't agree to something then take it back. That is just stupid. But this could be league spin.
if you have a million bucks and you divide it to 25 players in a basebell team, how much does each player get? compare it to basketball where you have 16 players.. basketball players will get a higher average salary than baseball players
I heard that too - I am no fan of Stern, but that was a little excessive on Hunters part (me thinks he doth protest too much !)
All those statements that they're pretty sure that a deal will get done and there will be a minimal, if any, lockout says to me that this will probably drag out for months and that half the 05-06 season will be cancelled.
no doubt it will drag out for months, but hopefully those are summer months. i am still optimistic that the lockout will last only thourgh preseason.
http://sports.espn.go.com/espn/print?id=2063343&type=story League suspends talks, says union backtracked By Chad Ford ESPN Insider On Tuesday, ESPN.com reported the details of that meeting between the agents and union chief Billy Hunter. "Billy put us on the spot," SFX agent David Bauman, whose firm represents more players than any other agency in the NBA, said. "He wanted to know if we had his back, whether we'd tell our players the same thing that we were telling him. We all stood up, every one of us, said our names and said we'd reject the offer. The deal the NBA is offering the players right now makes absolutely no sense. I've told my clients that. Every one of them agrees that the deal that's on the table is a bad one." The agents are especially concerned about several major issues. The biggest is the owners' insistence that guaranteed contracts be considerably shortened. Currently, players can sign a contract for a maximum of six or seven years, depending upon whether the player is signing with a new team (six years) or his current team (seven years). The owners have been trying to get that rolled back to three and four years. Three other issues have become sticking points: 1) the owners' proposal to reduce the amount of annual raises in a contract from 10 percent to 5 percent; 2) a "super luxury tax" that would more harshly penalize teams that spend more than a certain predetermined threshold; and 3) the proposed minimum age requirement of 20 years old. The league's release implied that the agents might have taken control of the process. Granik said he didn't know why the union reversed itself on the issues after the meeting. "I don't know why," Granik said. "After I read your column and from other things that I heard, it appears to be a possibility that the agents are responsible for what happened here. I don't have personal knowledge of this." "Regardless of why, they've been backing up on half a dozen things. When you're backing off points that have already been agreed to, it's impossible to make a deal." While the Players' Association had no comment on the league's latest release, a players' source said he was shocked by the league's public announcement. "Stern has been saying for months that nothing is agreed to until the entire agreement is agreed to," the source told ESPN.com. "That's the nature of collective bargaining. How can they say we agreed to anything unless the whole deal was agreed to?" In the NBA's press release, it contended the players reneged on an agreement to reduce the maximum length of contracts to five years. When pressed on the point, Granik conceded that "agreed" might not be the right world. "As a matter of law, nothing's agreed to until it's all agreed to," Granik said. "As a practical matter, the way you reach agreement is that you eliminate issues and put them to the side." Still, don't be surprised to see talks begin soon enough. Both sides say they aren't that far apart on key issues and that a deal can be worked out in time. "I'm still hopeful," an NBA league source said. "At the end of the day, both sides really want to get a deal done. A lockout is the worst-case scenario. No one really wants it to happen. Hopefully, after the dust settles, people will start making up." Chad Ford covers the NBA for ESPN Insider.
I think this is a point that everyone has been quick to forget. Stern himself has been telling us that the CBA comes as one piece; each particular issue gets revisited as concessions are made in other places. This seems like grandstanding on the league's part in an effort to garner public sympathy for the battle against the big bad union. I don't see how you can blame the union here. They just want status quo, the owners are the ones pushing for new concessions. If the owners didn't want to take an even larger portion of the pie, they could have just extended the last CBA and would already be done. I can't blame the union for not just bending over when they're told. If the union has made a mistake, I think it's that they weren't aggressive enough in making demands. When all they want is status quo, they can't concede anything without losing ground. What concessions mean in this negotiation is, Will the league take more or less? If the players demanded flat panel TVs in every locker or anything at all, then they could give that up and be no worse for wear. They are on the defensive and the league has them back on their heels as a result. They've been way too conciliatory.
