Meeting between NBA owners and players set to be held on Tuesday – Lockout News
The NBA owners and the players union (NBPA) officials are expected to meet over the labour dispute on Tuesday. The two sides will meet in New York as time continues to wind down to the start of the 2011-12 NBA season.
The meeting will be the first, since the league announced cancellation of the NBA training camps on Friday. The training camps were scheduled to begin on October 3rd but with the two sides nowhere close to reaching an agreement on the new Collective Bargaining agreement, these camps along with a week of exhibition games were postponed indefinitely.
The league and the players have many sticking points in the argument over a new CBA. The one in the limelight recently has been the tussle over salary caps. NBA Commissioner David Stern wants a hard cap in place in order to control spending and provide a level playing field for NBA franchise from all markets.
The NBPA on the other hand, does not want players to come under further constraints from a hard cap. NBPA Executive Director Billy Hunter recently described it as a “blood issue” for the players and they have refused to back down on the matter. There have also been reports that NBPA has even offered economic incentives to the league in exchange for the Salary Cap.
Ahead of Tuesday’s meeting, NBPA President Derek Fisher, in a letter, has pleaded with the players to stay united. He believes that the league could bow down over the salary cap issue because many owners are divided over it. Some owners are not prepared to lose a whole season because of soft salary caps and favour a CBA that would give them other advantages instead.
Fisher highlighted that this could be the breakthrough the players needed.
"There are a number of team owners that will not lose the season over the hard cap system. We've been clear from Day 1 of this process that we cannot sign off on a deal that attempts in any way to include a hard salary cap for our teams. That has not changed,"
Although the differences between the sides have remained large, it is encouraging that discussions are being held on a regular basis now. The NBA and the players union did not show any inclination to talk during the first 2 months of the lockout but in September, the pace has certainly picked up considerably.
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