The NBA and NBA Players Association seem to be at am impasse in their efforts to make a deal and prevent another lockout. The NBA are proposing deals but none of them are within the NBPA’s ball park. Which is unfortunate. If they can’t find a solution now. I don’t see how they can find one in the near future. But maybe I’m a little pessimistic when it comes to this.
Union Head of the NBPA Michele Roberts has been trading blows with NBA Commissioner Adam Silver. But according to Gary Washburn of the Boston Globe, she believes that they will find a deal that will be a win-win situation.
When asked whether a deal could get done before 2017, Roberts said, “Sure. Wouldn’t it be great for everybody, the players, for the owners, and God knows the fans, if we could say these were the major issues that we knew we had to deal with and we saw no reason to wait until 2017, so we got them done? Not only is there not going to be any opting out, but we’ve agreed to these new terms and an extension of the CBA. Wouldn’t everybody just be delighted? It would be great for the game.”
“There’s always going to be a give-and-give,” she said. “There will be some items that will be of no consequence to the players. ‘Sure, you want that? It doesn’t affect us. Fine.’ It’s never a good thing to walk in and say, ‘My position is not going to move.’ We just have to keep talking.
“Lockouts happen when you stop talking. Strikes happen when you stop talking. You keep talking, and talk until you have a new contract.”
“The one thing that I would like to believe, and still believe, is that the commissioner, the league, the owners as much as the players, do not want [a work stoppage].”
That is the best statement I’ve heard when it comes to all this. “Lockouts happen when you stop talking”.
Love every word about that. They need to keep in communication. Sit down with each other regularly and hash things out. If they stop, expect a lockout.
But I’ll say it now. If next season starts and progress is still at this stage or somewhere similar. A lockout is imminent. But again. Maybe I’m being pessimistic.
