Derek Fisher set to miss the Las Vegas league – NBA Update
It has been confirmed that Los Angeles guard Derek Fisher will not take part in the Las Vegas league beginning tonight. The Los Angeles Lakers point guard seemingly declared for the event earlier and his name is mentioned on a
team roster for the league, but he will not feature due to other commitments.
The Las Vegas summer league is held annually but was cancelled due to the NBA lockout this season. The NBA franchises, officials and coaches have been barred from contacting players for the duration of the work stoppage. Therefore
some organizers have gotten together and scheduled a Vegas League for the fall.
The league has been dubbed Impact Basketball Academy's "Competitive Training Series" and will feature teams with around seven to eight players. There will be a proper league and playoffs followed by a championship game. Unlike
other pro-am leagues that have sprung up during the lockout, only NBA players will be competing in Vegas.
It was first reported by some sources that Fisher will not be able to participate and now the guard has confirmed it through a social networking site, Twitter.
"While I fully support the Impact League and all the players, I have NOT committed to playing, nor can I at this point," Fisher tweeted. "My first priority is serving as president of the NBAPA. Everything else comes as a far second
right now. I'd love to play, but no plans to given my schedule of meetings and my lead role in them."
Although some sources suggest that there is still a chance of Fisher making an appearance in the latter stages of the competition, it does appear unlikely. As president of the NBA Players Association Fisher is a busy man with a
number of commitments.
Fisher, along with players’ union executive director Billy Hunter, has been at the forefront of labour negotiations with NBA Commissioner David Stern and the owners. After two months of scant activity in terms of meetings between
the two parties things have picked up since the month began.
The players union and league representatives met on two consecutive days for over 5 hour sessions last week and another meeting is scheduled to take place on Tuesday which will be attended by Fisher. Derek though will be joined
by a number of executive committee members of the union as it was decided in the previous meetings to get more and more people involved in the discussions at this point.
Many analysts have termed Tuesday’s meeting as very important as it is widely thought in the NBA community that crunch time for the negotiations has arrived. The NBA training camps are scheduled to begin next month and fans are
desperate to see some sort of breakthrough now.
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