Knicks · Players go for decertification (page 1)

Crap! the end of the NBA...

I hope the players succeed, but I'll be very surprised if they do. What a disaster, just as the Knicks were ready to start competing again.

Thats all that matters.

Anyway, see you next year.

AnubisADL wrote:Players letting their pride get the best of them. They about to get the NHL treatment. SMH.

I agree.

OasisBU wrote:I am a little surprised, I never thought it would come to this.

Never underestimate the combined powers of greed and stupidity.

How could Stern let everything he's built over the years get destroyed this close to the end of his career?- was the MLE for tax paying teams really worth it? Was insisting on high luxury tax penalties worth it? They'd won on the economics, couldn't they have conceded on the system- if the small market owners had just accepted their crappy management was the reason their teams sucked, they wouldn't have pushed such a hardline.

Whatever the outcome now, the NBA's pretty much finished- we miss a season, and I don't think the quality of play will recover from a year off. Regardless of who wins, so many fans will have been alienated, niether side will ever make up the money.

smackeddog wrote:Hunter did hint that the NBA could settle out of court, but they'd need to do that via the lawyers- basically to stop this, they have to reach a new system agreement with Kessler- if you've been following the lockout, he's the union's most hated, most hardline lawyer, who Stern said was divisive and the reason for no agreement having been reached.

How could Stern let everything he's built over the years get destroyed this close to the end of his career?- was the MLE for tax paying teams really worth it? Was insisting on high luxury tax penalties worth it? They'd won on the economics, couldn't they have conceded on the system- if the small market owners had just accepted their crappy management was the reason their teams sucked, they wouldn't have pushed such a hardline.

Whatever the outcome now, the NBA's pretty much finished- we miss a season, and I don't think the quality of play will recover from a year off. Regardless of who wins, so many fans will have been alienated, niether side will ever make up the money.

While I agree this is a hasty move and both sides have been stupid, lets remember that baseball went on strike too and they eventually recovered. Sure it took a while, but the fans came back.

Now the NHL is another story, but I think basketball fans are more passionate about the sport and it will eventually come back strong. At least I hope.

I wonder just how educated the players are top to bottom as to what decertification means.

Some of these guys are not very smart and rely on others for business matters.

Some of these players have never been told "no" since they were in the 6th grade.

Its not for me to say whats fair or not, but I just don't know if these guys financially can handle missing a year or the fact they can never make up the money.

The owners, I suppose they crunched the numbers and figured it out. They have lines of credit waiting for them.

I do feel bad for the guys like Billups set to make 14mil and does not have much time left.
Grant Hill who is not playing for money anymore, Nash whose clock is ticking, and KG who might be driving his wife nuts being around the house and perhaps yelling at his fish tank!

Hockey had a complete set of problems stemming mostly form the lack of a national contract and a salary structure that was completly nuts. That league lacks stars and came back strong because of the team concept.

The owners want more, the players want as much as they can. Both are at fault.

Maybe in a court of law it gets figured out.

Those small market teams think they have attendance problems now.....more than a season off will see many teams totally fail due to apathy.

Also, if Stern succeeds in Voiding contracts, the NBA landscape (roster) wise can end up totally different from now. You think your happy with the idea of Melo & Amare...well if contracts get voided, it changes the game.

Say Dwight being a free agent once the lockout is resolved says: "Hey Amare, come join me in LA?" You think Amare doesn't seriously consider....New York Loyalty or no New York Loyalty. Then Amare call up Melo and is like "I know you like that whole coming home thing but, I'm signing in LA to play with Dwight, you should roll with us."

Melo, then after thinking it through decides, wifey can market herself just as well in LA as NY.

That is my current fear, that the desertification will change everything.

OasisBU wrote:

While I agree this is a hasty move and both sides have been stupid, lets remember that baseball went on strike too and they eventually recovered. Sure it took a while, but the fans came back.

Now the NHL is another story, but I think basketball fans are more passionate about the sport and it will eventually come back strong. At least I hope.

Yes, but what worries me is that the nba requires a higher level of athleticism than baseball and hockey- a whole year off may ruin a lot of these players, they'll never get their game back.

The union, by disclaiming have also ensured that the players cannot cave in- there's no union anymore for them to cave in with- it really is all or nothing now. I don't know why people say they're being greedy- they are set to lose a shed load of money and had already given up 7% of BRI. It all came down to they system and it was all totally avoidable. So frustrating!

Also I wonder about how much of the owners position was posturing- many of the struggling owners don't actually have that much money- I think Sarver and also the Spurs owner were only valued at the same amount as their team- they don't have endless reserves. The top teams didn't want the lockout either. Were there really 15 who were willing to go this route, or did they think they players would never opt for this response?

i hate missing a season, but i think the owners are going way too far, basically trying to bully the players thinking fans will turn on them.

why are the players at fault, mostly?

they conceded huge amounts and still it wasn't enough.

the owners want to limit player movement in a league with hardly any player movement, and where the crappiest teams get the only real chance at a top player via the draft.

yeah, sounds like a fair system...hah!

you want a fair league? i don't want parity if it means the crappiest run teams are rewarded, and players have little to no choice who their employers are ever in their career.

some folks act like because people are professional athletes they forfeit all rights that most workers enjoy regardless of profession or salary.

none of us are good enough to be in the league, so it's not just a game...it's a PROFESSION.

here's what i wrote elsewhere about some of the system changes the nba wants:

The problem with limiting player movement in the NBA is that all it takes is one superstar to turn a franchise around, or become a contender. If free-agency is so limited it would appear to make the draft the primary means of creating a winning team.

Which indirectly increases the reward for the worst run teams with, now, the best chance at the players with the most potential to be such a star.

Where's punishment for badly run teams? Most seems directed at wealthy teams, who at least tried to win, even Isiah's Knicks.

What about those teams that basically never bothered to field a team designed to win for the past 10 years? Where is the punishment for Oak City for running their franchise into the ground in Seattle with little concern for the fans, which resulted in putting them in a position to get Durant, with zero intention of remaining in Seattle, and then a year later Westbrook?

So they might add a clause that forces teams be within 90% of the salary cap. That doesn't seem like enough of a deterrent.

Couldn't a team's strategy be to field a squad of mediocre players that meets the cap requirement, yet so bad as a unit that they put themselves in a position to get a top draft pick.

That seems like a possible approach teams who have no superstars could take to have a chance at getting a shot at winning, and since there are so few superstars in a draft, if any at all, we could see several teams taking this approach for years, no?

The need to end tanking in the NBA is not being addressed, and perhaps is now encouraged even more.

If these system changes come into place we're basically going to see very limited player movement, other than for role players.

I want to see bottom teams relegated to the NBDL. Of course, this is not going to happen, but hardly should the bottom teams under this structure be rewarded with pretty much the primary way of getting a top player, since free-agency is basically being castrated under the latest proposal by the NBA.

if i'm the players i seriously think about creating my own league, where they have real buy-in to performance and to ownership.

tkf wrote:

AnubisADL wrote:Players letting their pride get the best of them. They about to get the NHL treatment. SMH.

I agree.

Yep. I agree with this as well.

Both sides were too close to end up at this point with very little hope. I wonder what the union wanted to change? I can't have been that much considering how far they went on BRI.

Here's a link that discusses the difference between a notice of disclaimer and decertifcation:

http://ken-berger.blogs.cbssports.com/mc...

Rather than waiting for the players to get the necessary signatures to dissolve the union by seeking a time-consuming decertification vote, Billy Hunter could advise commissioner David Stern that, if no further negotiations occur before the Wednesday deadline to accept the owners' deal, he will have no choice but to step aside as executive director of the union.

The legal term for this would be a disclaimer of interest, which would only require a letter from Hunter to Stern advising him that the National Basketball Players Association no longer exists as the bargaining unit for the players.

The advantage of this for the players would be that, once the letter is sent, their attorneys would not have to wait 45-60 days for the National Labor Relations Board to authorize an election to formally dissolve the union. With a disclaimer of interest, the players could almost immediately commence an anti-trust lawsuit against the NBA, said Gabe Feldman, director of the Sports Law Center at Tulane University.

K22 wrote:

OasisBU wrote:I am a little surprised, I never thought it would come to this.

Never underestimate the combined powers of greed and stupidity.

Yep, especially stupidity. How can 2/3rds of the players vote to decertify? May be a handful 30-40 players in total will benefit from this all the other players will lose. They should have taken the 50-50.

BasketballJones wrote:The union served a "notice of disclaimer", which is different from decertification. I'm just pointing this out because of the title of this thread, and I see guys continuing to refer to decertification.

Here's a link that discusses the difference between a notice of disclaimer and decertifcation:

http://ken-berger.blogs.cbssports.com/mc...

Rather than waiting for the players to get the necessary signatures to dissolve the union by seeking a time-consuming decertification vote, Billy Hunter could advise commissioner David Stern that, if no further negotiations occur before the Wednesday deadline to accept the owners' deal, he will have no choice but to step aside as executive director of the union.

The legal term for this would be a disclaimer of interest, which would only require a letter from Hunter to Stern advising him that the National Basketball Players Association no longer exists as the bargaining unit for the players.

The advantage of this for the players would be that, once the letter is sent, their attorneys would not have to wait 45-60 days for the National Labor Relations Board to authorize an election to formally dissolve the union. With a disclaimer of interest, the players could almost immediately commence an anti-trust lawsuit against the NBA, said Gabe Feldman, director of the Sports Law Center at Tulane University.

Oh.nice so the majority of the players who would get screwed by this don't even have a say do in the decertification! Wasn't aware the union heads could force this without consulting the players.

loweyecue wrote:

K22 wrote:

OasisBU wrote:I am a little surprised, I never thought it would come to this.

Never underestimate the combined powers of greed and stupidity.

Yep, especially stupidity. How can 2/3rds of the players vote to decertify? May be a handful 30-40 players in total will benefit from this all the other players will lose. They should have taken the 50-50.