Updated throughout the day with quick takes from staff.
Steve Aschburner has a lovely little column on NBA.com looking at the dispute over the NBA's use of "average player salary" to shape lockout discussions. The NBA's average salary is $5.15 million, but at least one agent urges consideration of the league's median salary, which is just $2.33 million. It's a semantic point, but does it have value?
Certainly ... for the union. Half of the NBA makes less than $2.33 million. Half makes more. That's a lot of money, as Aschburner notes, but it's not as much as $5.15 million. Most savvy fans know that some players make upwards of $20 million, and obviously that skews the average upward. If you match that with the median, it shows a huge pay gap between the top and bottom of the league.
As I've argued before, the P.R. game doesn't mean a whole lot for the actual resolution of the lockout; David Stern doesn't need high approval ratings, he just needs to not damage his stars' reputations going forward. As such, the semantic point is more something for writers to quibble about than fans to concern themselves with. But it remains an interesting point.
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Comments
We should take their money and give it to the players that really need it.
"We're not talking about me and Darko in the same sentence." - Chris Webber vs KAHN!
by caseycheesecake on Aug 20, 2011 12:08 PM EDT reply actions
no
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 Aug 21, 2011 11:45 PM EDT up reply actions
I was kidding.
"We're not talking about me and Darko in the same sentence." - Chris Webber vs KAHN!
by caseycheesecake on Aug 22, 2011 1:07 AM EDT up reply actions
The perfect reason for a hard cap
Even if you sign one player for 20 mil you will need a lot more for the other 14 players on the roster. So we should see that median number rise a bit as the big salaries come down. The true tier one players will get their money but the rest will get what they deserve not what they want.
"Do not panic, all is well" Kevin Bacon in the parade scene in the movie Animal House
by mjdinhouston on Aug 21, 2011 10:15 AM EDT reply actions
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