CBA Negotiations fail; Lockout to take affect on Friday – NBA Labour Dispute Update
The NBA owners have decided that they will lockout the players beginning Friday, when the existing CBA or Collective Bargaining Agreement expires. The league owners intimated this to the representatives of the National Basketball
Players Association in the final pre-lockout meeting held between the two sides on Thursday.
The lockout does not come as a surprise and many believed that the so called last gasp negotiation session on Thursday was just for show, as the owners and players were simply too far apart in their demands.
The owners need a vote of the Labour Relations Committee to make the lockout formal.
The players, and the NBA fans, had been expecting the lockout for a long time now because negotiations failed to produce any meaningful progress. This is the first time the league will enter lockout mode since the 1998-1999 season
was shortened due to a dispute over the CBA back then.
The executive director of the players union Billy Hunter confirmed that the lockout did not come as a surprise,
“I’ve been anticipating this lockout for the last two or three years, and now it’s here.” Said Hunter.
Billy Hunter also revealed that the players did not plan on going to the courts yet. It should be noted that the players of the NFL took their labour dispute to a court and won a favourable verdict.
Commenting on the lockout Adam Silver, the league’s deputy commissioner, claimed that the previous CBA was just not workable for the teams and therefore changes had to be made,
"The expiring collective bargaining agreement created a broken system that produced huge financial losses for our teams," said NBA Deputy Commissioner Adam Silver. "We need a sustainable business model that allows all 30 teams
to be able to compete for a championship, fairly compensates our players, and provides teams, if well-managed, with an opportunity to be profitable."
Although the players have agreed to change the CBA in order to help out the NBA franchises, 22 of whom posted losses last season, the proposals of the two sides for achieving that goal vary significantly.
The players want the teams to consider revenue sharing as in the current model teams with larger markets gain benefits that do not translate to teams with smaller markets. They have also offered to lower their share of BRI, Basketball
Related Income, to 54.3 percent from the current 57 percent.
The owners however want more. They have proposed much lower salaries for the players than they currently earn and also want a larger share of the BRI, amid proposals to bring changes to what the BRI means so as to favour the owners.
The two sides have not scheduled further talks yet and it is likely that the situation will become worse before it becomes better.
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