Schmeelk: Saving The NBA Season
By John Schmeelk
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By Monday, everyone is going to know whether or not the NBA season is going to start on time. If Commissioner David Stern is to be believed, we might even know if there's going to be a season at all. It seems much more bluster than reality, but it sends a message that this weekend is crucial to the future of the NBA.
I could write pages and pages on hard caps, soft caps, BRI (basketball related income), revenue sharing and the other debated points of the inevitable future labor agreement but I would be wasting my time. No one cares who "wins" this fight. No one cares if the players get 48% of basketball related income or 52%. No one cares how much money some of these NBA teams are actually losing in comparison to what they claim. Fans just want a basketball season.
And the reality is, as important these numbers are to the economics of the game, they aren't that important to those negotiating anymore either. It's all a matter of how willing the players are to lose a season and whether or not they believe the owners are willing to cancel one. What is each side willing to sacrifice but still declare a victory?
If there is one thing that can submarine this NBA season, it's a false belief by the NBA players that the owners will eventually cave into their demands. There are enough owners losing money, or not making enough that they would be willing to miss a season to get the future financial concessions they desire. If the players believe their rank and file can outlast NBA owners, they are fooling themselves. It's not going to happen.
If reports are to be believed, the NBA owners came off the idea of a hard cap, and offered the players a larger share of BRI in their meeting a couple of days ago. David Stern then walked out of the meeting and made the point to the media that the players' reaction to the proposal would determine the fate of the NBA regular season. I believe him and the NBA players would do well to believe him too.
If the NBA players come back to the negotiating table this weekend without giving ground, the NBA owners will close up shop and cancel at least a month of basketball games. Their offers will get worse, not better. David Stern offered an olive branch to the players, an indication the owners are ready to make a deal now to play a full season. If the players accept that branch and get serious now, they'll do as well as they possibly can in these negotiations.
The players need to realize that it is inevitable they are going to come out of this far worse than where they were in 2010. The owners are billionaires with other businesses that will allow them to survive without the league. The players are millionaires who spend money and need their pay checks. The longer it goes on, the more desperate the players will get, and the worse the owners' offers will be.
The players need to say to themselves: Is it worth permanently losing weeks of basketball, the corresponding checks, and negotiating leverage to simply prove a point? Why make an equal or worse deal three months from now, when the same or a better deal could be closed now. The players already got the owners to come off a hard cap, which was a non-starter for them. That should be enough of a win for Billy Hunter, the players, and even their agents to declare some sort of victory when all this is over. A lot of this is psychological, and both sides have to have some kind of good feeling walking away from this.
Is any of this fair? No. Are the owners likely overstating their losses? Yes. Do the owners have no one to blame but themselves for the bad decisions that put them in these financial straights? Yes. All that might matter in some abstract world of right and wrong, but it means nothing in negotiating. The only thing that matters is getting the best deal possible and the time for that is this weekend.
If the players come back offering a 50-50 split of BRI and add a couple exceptions to the much harder soft cap the owners offered, the owners will respond positively and the gap will close even more. Big market owners will pressure the hardline small market owners to move a little more, perhaps by offering more in revenue sharing. A deal could be had. The players would be worse off than they were in 2010, but they don't lose any game checks, the game isn't permanently damaged, and future players will be far from poor. Competitive balance might even be restored, making it harder for big market teams to attract a huge stall of superstar players.
The NFL season continues this weekend, and the baseball postseason gets started. But if you love the NBA, the most important thing that happens this weekend will be in an office building in New York City. At this point, it's on the players. Hold your breath and pray they show up with a concession, and a season can be saved.
You can follow me on twitter for a lot on the NBA, Knicks, Giants, NFL and MLB at http://twitter.com/#!/Schmeelk. I'll try to keep you updated on the lockout negotiations over the weekend.
