brownbobcat wrote:The prisoner's dilemma doesn't really have anything to do with cheating. It's a construct whereby both players would benefit if they cooperated. The payoff system is such that you will always stand to benefit more by not cooperating, though, and this results in both players not cooperating and experiencing the worst outcome.
= Incentive to cheat, people will cheat. Ask an economic professor, and that's the way he/she would explain it. Not sure if you actually studied economics before or just looked up the definition.
brownbobcat wrote:In the PD, a player suffers if he cooperates and the other doesn't. In the NBA, a GM definitely benefits if he "cooperates" (by not signing stupid contracts), while others hand out big deals. I think the current system results in SOME players being overpaid drastically, but I don't think they're overpaid as a collective group. At least, not to the extent that the problem couldn't be fixed by owners simply losing money and forcing themselves to spend less. Most contracts are eventually moveable. Arenas, Rashard, Vince, Hedo, CWebb, KG, LaFrentz, Baron Davis, and so on.
First off, KG shouldn't be on the list. Second, the cost of getting rid of Baron Davis and Raef LaFrentz was Kyrie Irving and Brandon Roy. Rashard was traded for Gilbert, and so on. The problems aren't really self correcting, as they are just moved from one place to another. Self correcting would imply there was something that can be done to their contracts to reflect their market worth after the fact. I guess is where we would differ in our opinions. You think some are overpaid, I think most and I say most because of bidding war between owners chasing a small number of quality free agents. This is also where I would argue speculation also play a big part of why salaries are inflated. Too many players/agent demand base on potential and not on actual performace.
