Every time David Stern opens his mouth to talk about the NBA lockout these days, the laugh-o-meter gets pegged ... until you consider the damage the commish is doing to the game.
Oct 14, 2011 - David Stern's interview with WFAN on Thursday actually made me laugh. The whole "NBA lockout could last until Christmas" thing stabbed at my heart, but the rest was just ... funny. Like a Shakespearean comedy, where the audience is in on the joke.
I mean, does The Commish not sound like a parody of himself at this point? I kept waiting for Frank Caliendo to break character and slip into some Charles Barkley to mindlessly agree with Stern, or some John Madden to liven up the affair. Stern continues to pound the points dozens of writers have blown apart like dandelions. (A few weeks ago, when asked if he could see the framework of a deal in the league's negotiations with the players' union, Stern dismissively joked that he'd leave that to the "bloggers." That sad thing is that bloggers representing each side could have had this deal done months ago in a form that I assure you will look similar to what we'll eventually get.)
Only Stern can keep a straight face when lilting through an explanation of the league's 4 percent annual growth projections on his way to a complaint that in seven years, under the NBA's plan, the average player's salary would rise from $5.5 million to $7 million ... which happens to represent 4 percent growth. He gives the listener no credit at all. Imagine sitting in a negotiation room with him.
If I hear the comparison between the L.A. Lakers' payroll and the Sacramento Kings' payroll one more time, I'm going to kick a Maloof. (Note to Adrienne Maloof's personal security detail: not your Maloof. One of the others. Probably George.) The Lakers-Kings comparison is cherry-picked, non-representative of history and reality, and completely irrelevant. The Kings were not trying to compete last year! They were trying to rebuild! When you rebuild, you don't sign available free agents to contracts that damage the flexibility you are trying to gain!
Imagine the comparison three years ago: the Memphis Grizzlies had a $50 million payroll, and, including taxes, the Dallas Mavericks were at something like $130 million. You just can't have that, right? As it turns out, the Grizzlies were stockpiling cap space and flexibility, which they'd use to get Zach Randolph and lock up Rudy Gay. And now they are knocking on the door. I imagine that in three years we will all look back on the Kings' grand culling as a proper step in their rebuilding, not a terrible thing that made Sacramento fans sad. This is how teams rebuild. It's not as if teams in the glorious NFL don't rebuild by scrapping everyone, hitting rock bottom and bouncing back up. As noted in Thursday's Hook, eight of the NFL's 32 teams have missed the playoffs in each of the past five years. That number is three in the NBA.
Stern continues to act as if dropping the owners' request for the abolition of guaranteed contracts was a real concession, but disses any proposal that the players have made. Consider that of all the many, many proposals, concepts and ideas thrown around by both sides, every single one has a net negative affect on players compared to the last collective bargaining agreement. Not one of the concepts asks owners for anything more than what they did in the last CBA. The entire lockout debate in that room has been about magnitude and type of sacrifice from the players. (Remember, the owners are doing revenue sharing themselves, without player input.)
I mean, how audacious that the players' proposal would include 10 percent raises! ... when the last CBA had 10.5 percent raises. The NBA thinks it's appropriate -- in addition to slashing the players' revenue share and hardening the cap in some way -- to cut the maximum length of contracts down to three years for free agents, four years for Bird rights players and five years for a Super Bird player. The old cap on length -- first instituted in 1999 at seven years -- was decreased to five for non-Bird, six for Bird players in 2005. Players have offered to decrease each a year, while owners want to go down two. Why does anyone think the bigger concession is the more fair one? Why does Stern paint the players as greedy for not consenting to his demands? At what point have the players asked for something they don't already have?
At his worst, Stern fuels his fans' paranoia. A major narrative of the post-Decision has been the terrible plight of small-market teams like Cleveland, cities without glamour or riches that watch their homegrown stars leave for the bright lights of Hollywood, of Manhattan, of South Beach. Stern's got plenty to say to those fans, like, "If you live in a market where you have a perception as a fan that it's only open to the rich teams to have the best players, then you're starting out in a bad way."
Of the 15 players who made an All-NBA team in 2010-11 -- the top 15 players in the NBA, really -- six play in top-10 media markets (L.A., Dallas, New York, Chicago and Atlanta -- no one from Philly, S.F., Boston, D.C. or Houston made All-NBA), two play in Miami (No. 16 market, but wealthy), and the remaining seven play in what we would call small markets: Orlando, Oklahoma CIty (2), New Orleans, San Antonio, Portland and Memphis. About half of the league's All-NBA team played in small markets. If fans have a perception that it's only open to the rich teams to have the best players, then those fans are wrong. If the commissioner is using that inaccurate perception as a talking point to make his lockout case, he is being disingenuous at best and baldly dishonest at worst.
The only problem is this: every time David Stern opens his mouth with a microphone in front of it, he is using inaccurate perceptions as talking points to make his lockout case. It's getting really old really fast. It's only funny until you start thinking about the damage he's doing to the NBA brand every second he keeps this lockout alive.
The Hook runs Monday through Friday. See the archives.
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Comments
Something is strange about how Stern is acting this time around
Of course, it’s clear he works for the owners. But he seems to be taking an extremely hard line here. I wonder why? Are the new owners tilting the balance away from reason and toward utter greed?
I personally think that franchises have been overvalued for years. In 1980, the Mets were sold for 25 million. How is it that the price of a franchise has raised 20 fold? Personally, I think the recession has decreased the value of franchises, and though the Warriors and Pistons still got sold, a buyer could not be found for New Orleans.
Many franchises may be profitable on a year to year basis and some may not – but the main way of getting a profit from these franchises – selling it for a 100 million more than you bought it for – may be disappearing forever, and I think Stern knows it, and I think the owners know it, and I think that’s why they are trying to get severe changes now. Because their main ace in the hole – being able to sell their teams – is going bye bye. And I sense a desperation here. I wonder if Stern guaranteed a certain type of deal to push through the Detroit sale?
I have a feeling that multiple franchise bankruptcies might be a big possiblity – and that this lockout is a desperate move to increase the value of the franchises themselves – even if it takes a year long lockout. But I think the loss of the TV money might be too much for the NBA to take, so we might see half a season.
It’s a risky play though, because a players league could develop and scuttle the franchises’ values almost completely.
Get The Frickin' Rebound
by fuhry on Oct 14, 2011 11:40 AM EDT reply actions
Not worried on a rival competitor to the NBA
unless Nike and Pepsi (both not official NBA sponsors) dump money into it. None of these summer league games had buzz like NBA games, and only the hardcore NBA fans went anyway.
Yes, the flexible owners like Abe Pollin and Jerry Buss are gone or will soon be gone. The new boys in town like Ted Leonsis, Tom Gores, Alex Meruelo, and even Michael Jordan are expecting a much more stable model in their favor. They also want to be in a position to have as good of a chance to win as the Lakers do when they build their teams right, and the last system did not allow that.
any talk about OKC and Memphis not spending crazy is simply because the teams’ cores are young and on the beginning end of their championship window. three or four years from now, they’d have to spend ridiculous money to keep their guys assuming the teams continue to play as well as they did last year.
by thewiz06 on Oct 14, 2011 11:51 AM EDT up reply actions 2 recs
Agreed wholeheartedly.
It’s not a matter of small-market players getting to have A good player. It’s about them being able to have one and keep them without crippling the rest of their ability to get good players around that star through any means other than hoping to get lucky in the draft.
Personal attacks are the weapon of the ignorant.
Panthers '011: This is what we've been waiting for...we get to overpay the core of a 2-14 team!
by MichaelProcton on Oct 14, 2011 3:48 PM EDT up reply actions
There were potential buyers for Hornets,only
They were going to move the team out of NO which Stern didn’t want.
Plus it was kind of convenient for the other Owners to pay out of their team’s revenues to buy out Shinn. Makes their books look worse just in time for negotiating w/the Players.
by Tisbee on Oct 14, 2011 12:23 PM EDT up reply actions
A "players' league" will NEVER develop.
They simply don’t have the capital to build, operate, and maintain the arenas or to finance the other day-to-day operations of a pro league.
Personal attacks are the weapon of the ignorant.
Panthers '011: This is what we've been waiting for...we get to overpay the core of a 2-14 team!
by MichaelProcton on Oct 14, 2011 3:45 PM EDT up reply actions 1 recs
LET'S FREAK OUT!!!!!!!!!!!
The brand will be okay in the end. There are enough young talented players in the game and NCAA basketball is going to give free hype and fill the vacuum for the time being. The league will be alright when games start back up. Although yeah, absolutely hiding the real agenda here, and it ain’t “the hard cap will make it more competitive year in and year out.” It’s about “Oh you don’t like the hard cap player’s union, we’ll be willing to negotiate and get rid of this idea so long as you take a ridiculously low percentage of the revenue sharing pie which in fact will cap your pay just the same but this will make you feel like we brokered a deal when in fact we just got everything we really wanted.”
Words of wisdom from the great Billy Dee Williams
Oh so you disagree. Well then, here is a mature, sophisticated, and compelling rebuttal.
by wallywagon11 on Oct 14, 2011 3:04 PM EDT reply actions 2 recs
I've said before
I’m more or less in the owners corner on this fight, and despite TZ’s excellent arguments I too found most of the proposals Stern claims (in that interview linked above) he has made to the Players pretty reasonable from a Fans point of view.
I like the 5-4-3 contract lengths.
I like the proposal on being able to waive a non-performing player and spread the rest of his salary cap-wise over twice the length of the original contract. I wonder how many times / how often that opportunity should be allowed but. . .
I like the more punitive luxury tax though I think the owners are too high at this point – but think there is some middle ground to be found (I’m unclear on what the players are proposing) I think a $1 to $1 for the first 5 mil, $1.50 for the next $5 mil – etc, makes some sense, though I haven’t ground through the numbers yet. (I do assume the system will be similar, a soft cap and then a higher lux tax thresh hold that we’re talking about.)
I DO think every owner deserves a reasonable chance to make money almost every year (like ALL players do) and not just have to wait for a future sale – and still be competitive. It just doesn’t bother me that they’re rich guys – that shouldn’t mean that they should be expected to lose money by owning a team.
And I (perhaps fooooolishly) hope that a new system will eventually lower tix prices for fans.
"Victory goes to the player who makes the next-to-last mistake."
- Chessmaster Savielly Grigorievitch Tartakower
by lietothegirls on Oct 14, 2011 3:10 PM EDT reply actions 3 recs
I also don't understand why a 50-50 split isn't a reasonable solution . . .
In the end, whether TZ agrees or not, these numbers the owners are proposing mostly sound reasonable to the average fan.
"Victory goes to the player who makes the next-to-last mistake."
- Chessmaster Savielly Grigorievitch Tartakower
by lietothegirls on Oct 14, 2011 3:13 PM EDT up reply actions 2 recs
I think 50-50 is reasonable too
but I can completely understand the players balking at dropping from 57% to 50%. If they had a time machine, it would be a smart idea to have had the split 50-50 from the start.
Sanka....you dead? Ya Man
by prowseinthehouse on Oct 14, 2011 4:21 PM EDT up reply actions
Best line:
“(Note to Adrienne Maloof’s personal security detail: not your Maloof. One of the others. Probably George.)”
/ Wondering if I should change my signature
by kwill on Oct 16, 2011 4:59 PM EDT reply actions
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