Jason Terry gives an insight on labour negotiations – NBA News
Dallas Mavericks star Jason Terry is a man with a view on everything and the talk of the town – the NBA labour dispute – has certainly not escaped his attention.
Terry recently talked about the mechanics of the actual negotiations and how invested are the people during the meetings.
The NBA lockout started July 1st and is into its third month already. The league and the players have failed to come to a compromise over a new CBA. In fact, the NBA owners and players have hardly budged from their stances
and not even been on the discussion table that often. During the first two months of the lockout, the sides only met two times.
They picked up a little in September. Two back to back meetings were held that gave rise to some optimism over a deal being reached, but a bad negotiating session on Tuesday poured cold water on any progress that had been made.
The sticking issue, reportedly, was the salary cap system and NBA Commissioner David Stern’s rigidity on the matter.
There are reportedly more meetings going to take place, one on Wednesday and another Thursday, both in New York. After the meetings it is obviously going to be diplomatic press briefings by the two parties, who will surely blame
each other in veiled words over one matter or another, while neither actually gives away what happened in the meetings.
Jason Terry has been very involved in the lockout situation. A current NBA World Champion with the Dallas Mavericks, Terry is concerned over the matter and has even been to some player-owner meetings.
Terry says the meetings are very intense as both parties have a lot at stake,
"When you're in there, as opposed to reading in the newspaper or watching on TV, you really get to see people's reactions and really see how important this deal is, not only to the owners, but to the players and not only my era
but to eras that we will leave behind," Terry told ESPNDallas.
He revealed though, that one has to keep their calm during the meetings and keep in view the bigger picture.
With the threat of games being lost, or even the season, becoming more credible with each passing day, there are suggestions that both sides, especially players who are going to lose pay checks, will get to some quick solutions
and save the day at the last moment.
Terry doesn’t believe so. He said in the interview that the players are determined not to cave in because that will be counterproductive in the long run.
"Because it's getting down to the final minutes, we don't want to rush into anything just to try to save the season. But, as we stand right now, the owners aren't moving and we definitely are staying strong together as a union."
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