The_NeX wrote:theonlyeastcoastrapsfan wrote:Coach Smiley wrote:it's not the players fault that the owners don't know how to make money off of a billion dollar industry, the owners are asking for protection from their own stupid decisions
Easy to point the finger. How many agents would have had their players take less than the market dictated or sign a non guaranteed deal? I don't recall how many agents and players were applauding the Clippers for their frugality. When I take a piece of crap back to the store, I understand I may not get my money back, but I expect that the store has the humility not to laugh in my face for my patronage.
Any owner would have loved to sign a short term non guaranteed deal for less, would the players and agents have signed it? Do they not see that owners are competitive and are trying to win? Just because and argument feels good off the tongue, doesn't make it a good one.
I wonder if all the owners got together and said, okay, none of us offer guaranteed deals, or deals longer than three years, how long it would take agents to file a collusion charge. They play this game of exploit the system, and then blame the owners, and have the nerve to call Stern the bully?
Are you for real ? Why should anyone ask for less than what the market is offering him ? Might be im not understanding you, but i can't see how this make sense.
I think you may be missing my point. I'm not saying the player and agents should take less than the market allowed. What I'm saying is they never would. However,it's the old system, the one that caps max deals, allowed for Bird Rights and the mid-level, allowed for up to 5 years with certain % raises, and created a climate where the majority of every deal is guaranteed, which created the market. The Front office and players and agents simply work within that system. If players and agents would never have agreed to less because they didn't have to under the old system, then it's simply ignores the flaws in the system to put it all on owners bad decisions.
The deals were fair market deals at the time, the problem is the system left too little protection for owners from injury, or decline, or decreased motivation from players, and so now we act like owners and gms are fools for signing those deals. that tells me maybe there's an issue with the system. I don't blame BC for signing Amir, I wanted him to. I don't think he wanted to spend more money than he had to. I think his agent went out and felt the market out, and came back and made a deal. If the market was different Amir would have gotten less. You can blame BC if it's 32 and not 28 million, but it's not BC's fault that it's in that neighborhood, and not the 15 million neighborhood. That's based on the midlevel, going to average players that creates that market. and that's a system issue. And, that may need some tweaking. For example, was JO's old max deal a mistake? wasn't at the time, sure seemed like it at the end. So what should those fools in Indy have done differently? Wrapped his knee in bubble wrap? Orlando has an old owner who's desperate to win before he dies, so he spent too much on Rashard Lewis. Sucks now. However, they almost won.
I'm not saying that there aren't bad decisions out there, but to fault the owners, who you know would have paid less over less with less guaranteed if they could have, and not blame the system that created that market is short sighted. If they're merely guilty of their own bad decisions, and not of market forces, what would you have had them do differently. Not sign FA's? collude with each other to keep the market depressed? it's only a few teams that get players are taking less than otherwise to join them, the rest are forced to compete for players. To ignore that the CBA creates the field of competition and put it all on the owners need for restraint, and not to adjust the system is not realistic. and it's no wonder why the players want that system, because for every one but rookies and true true game changing superstars, the current system inflates their value. and there's far more of those players in the league than the John Wall's and LeBron's.
