Who do you support?

[phailing101]

Excellent article about how small market owner took control:

http://espn.go.com/blog/truehoop/post/_ ... ok-control

As I have stated earlier, the fight isn't really about the players and the owners, it's about big market teams vs small market teams.

You're incorrect about that.

To put it mathematically: (big market teams vs. small market teams) vs (top paid players vs middle/low range players) = lockout

Each side has their own internal divides.

[Ditchweed]

yeah, he's been trolling this topic and the cba topic. But they had it bad for many years too with the overspending and under performing team. And Isiah set them back years.

I have being posting here for 8 years and 95% of posts are in the Raptor board since I'm Raps fan despite being Knicks fan prior to the creation of the Raptors. Secondly what part of my posts do you think is "trolling"?

And how is being Raptors fan any better than Knicks fan? Please tell me how the Raptors have being model of management?

Raptors were around since 1995, you joined RealGM in 2003 using a Knicks id as your moniker, so "I'm Raps fan despite being Knicks fan prior to the creation of the Raptors" seems, well, let's just say odd. From what you are saying, you were a Raps fan when you joined with a Knicks id.

If it is true and you really are a Raps fan, change your id or there is not much else you should expect other than to be considered a troll for a large market team fan against a hard cap.

[Greg Stink]

Owners back off 50/50 BRI split, per WT. There will be dunks. I support this.

[Reignman]

They aren't backing off the 50/50 split, they are backing off the 50/50 "precondition" in discussing systemic changes.

Basically, they are now open to talking issues other than the BRI.

[Greg Stink]

They aren't backing off the 50/50 split, they are backing off the 50/50 "precondition" in discussing systemic changes.

Basically, they are now open to talking issues other than the BRI.

They blinked. They tried to make 50/50 ...their biggest, most unrealistic demand... a given, the foundation of the deal be considered on further points, and it didn't work. They're prepared to actually negotiate.

[Firesphere]

I hope they do something soon, I really don't care who gets paid what... I just want them to figure it out soon... and why did it take so long for talks to get so serious.. it seems like the only real effort has come in the last 2 months... why weren't people figuring this out more seriously at an earlier time?

Also, I know it can impact a league during playoffs, etc... but why don't owners and players get together during the actual season to settle some of this, each side knows what they want, it seems arbitrary that it waits until it can effect the livelihood of the owners and the players... just be grown-ups about it and figure out what you want and how to get there without having a standoff, talking for a full year prior to the new agreement would allow all the kinks to get worked out and hopefully in a more graceful manner.

Does it really help the league to have all these talks within such a time crunch?

[J-Roc]

Isiah Thomas was on the Fan 590 earlier. He said that when drastic changes to the system are proposed, it takes more than a couple of months to come around to it.

The players side almost has to run a model to see why whatever the Owners are asking for is probably going to screw the players in the long run. The owners probably have teams of numbercrunchers working on solutions which sound simple, but which would give a de facto hard cap.

[Pchu]

Excellent article about how small market owner took control:

http://espn.go.com/blog/truehoop/post/_ ... ok-control

As I have stated earlier, the fight isn't really about the players and the owners, it's about big market teams vs small market teams.

You're incorrect about that.

To put it mathematically: (big market teams vs. small market teams) vs (top paid players vs middle/low range players) = lockout

Each side has their own internal divides.

The big market team is totally happy with status quo. The Lakers, Heat, Knicks and the Mavs makes tonnes of money.

The small market teams want a bigger piece of the pie for obvious reasons. Minnesota for years have a high payroll, they can afford a monster contract for Kevin Garnett. So it's not really about salaries being higher, they just want more revenue sharing.

Marc Cuban has said that he worked 365 days a year to make his team more marketable, why should he share his hard-earn dollars to teams that don't do anything?

In essence, the smaller market teams want a new system so they can make money (which they aren't right now), and the big market team don't want to share revenue.

[Fairview4Life]

The Mavs lost money last year, according to the audited financials shared with the players.

[ronleroy]

stupid paul jones, he made it sound like something happened when i listened to him on the radio. Nothing being reported today...

[Parataxis]

They aren't backing off the 50/50 split, they are backing off the 50/50 "precondition" in discussing systemic changes.

Basically, they are now open to talking issues other than the BRI.

Kinda makes one wonder what they were talking about last week for umpteen hours, if they wouldn't talk about anything other than the BRI...

[Greg Stink]

Kinda makes one wonder what they were talking about last week for umpteen hours, if they wouldn't talk about anything other than the BRI...

I think what what happening was, the owners kept saying, "We want A, B, C, D assuming 50:50, which is non-negotiable", and the players kept saying, "Whoa, whoa, whoa... 50:50? F your precondition".

[Tenacious_C]

Bump

[Indeed]

Kinda makes one wonder what they were talking about last week for umpteen hours, if they wouldn't talk about anything other than the BRI...

I think what what happening was, the owners kept saying, "We want A, B, C, D assuming 50:50, which is non-negotiable", and the players kept saying, "Whoa, whoa, whoa... 50:50? F your precondition".

More like the owners said 47% at first, and these system issues.
Now they changed to 50%, and change the system issues to favour them.
Basically, the owners never backed up, while the players backed from 57% to 50%, and willing to have a season.

Perhaps it doesn't matter the numbers and issues to us, but the truth is, none of them is related to competitive parity.

[Salted Meat]

More like the owners said 47% at first, and these system issues.
Now they changed to 50%, and change the system issues to favour them.
Basically, the owners never backed up, while the players backed from 57% to 50%, and willing to have a season.

Perhaps it doesn't matter the numbers and issues to us, but the truth is, none of them is related to competitive parity.

A problem with the players position, is that, they should have never been starting from 57% in the first place. 57% was a pipe dream, and only used because it's what the players got in the last CBA.

Once the league came in and physically showed Fisher and Hunter that the league was, in fact, hemorrhaging money, the NBAPA knew they could have never gone back to 57%. However, it still, to this day, hasn't stopped them from claiming that they've "come down" and "given up" so far and so much, when the truth is, they were never going to get 57%.