OT- Dumb question about BRI and player contracts

[Chaos Engine]

This might be a dumb question, but I always wondered how does BRI affect player salaries? During the lockout players were fighting for a certain percentage, but how does it really affect the money they get?

If Player A has a 1 year 3 million dollar deal, doesn't his owner pay him the 3 million (minus taxes/union fees/agent fees). What does it matter if BRI is split 53-47 or 50-50, doesn't he still get his money either way? Does a lower percentage in favor of the owners means the player gets less money?

[Dunkenstein]

It's not a dumb question, it's just not one for which there is a simple answer. Basically the escrow system takes a percentage of each player's contracted salary, if the players as a group get more than their agreed-upon split of the BRI. Larry Coon explains how this works here:

www.cbafaq.com/salarycap.htm#Q19

[DBoys]

In addition to what Dunkenstein shared, the BRI split is the basis for determining the cap and luxury tax (and some other limits). The whole cap system (with teams required to spend at least 90% of the cap on team salaries, a soft cap to make it difficult to spend more than a certain amount, and luxury taxes to discourage significant overspending), is intended to facilitate an end result that all 30 teams in total spend the agreed-on percentage of revenues on player salaries, without spending more.

If the percentage was higher for the players than 50-50, the cap and luxury tax limits (as well as MLE, max salaries, and perhaps a few other numbers) would have been set at higher levels, and the amount spent on player salaries would be higher at the end of the day.

To put it in actual dollars, using the numbers (rounded) from last season:

BRI $4.3B
Players' split (50%) $2.15B
At 53%, Players' split would be $2.279B
At 53%, Additional player payroll (compared to 50% split) +$129M
Number of NBA players - approx 450 (30 teams, 15 per roster)
At 53%, Additional salary spending per team, on average (compared to 50% split) +$4.23M
At 53%, Additional per player, on average (compared to 50% split) +$286,667

The 50-50 split is the intended division of revenues until at least the end of the 2016-17 season.

[Chaos Engine]

Oh ok, so pretty much players were worried that with a 50-50 split salaries across the league would be lower. If it was split lets say 45-55 players/owners, would the max salary and average salary for players be lower?