NBA Players Association seeks a decision in Early Bird Rights favour – NBA Update
Before the start of next season, many players will be heading into free agency; and representatives of the NBA Players Association have come out to speak about the contracts of some of these players.
The NBPA has spoken about the situation of players like Jeremy Lin and Steve Novak of the New York Knicks, Chauncey Billups of the Los Angeles Clippers and J.J. Hickson of the Portland Trailblazers, asking the league to allow them
to re-sign with their teams without taking the salary cap into effect.
Lin`s future is secured with the Knicks, with him being an instrumental figure in the revival run of the franchise during the course of this season. However, him getting a contract leaves the Knicks with limited options and they
will have to make use of the Bird rights.
The union argues in favour of these players to be able to resign with their teams in accordance with the “Early Bird Rights”. These rights allow a certain organization to exceed their salary cap in order for them to reacquire the
services of their own players.
“Bird and Early Bird rights are among the most valuable rights that players have under the collective bargaining agreement; these rights simply cannot be extinguished in the absence of an affirmative decision by a player to select
a team through free agency. We will ask the arbitrator to resolve this dispute on an expedited basis and prior to the commencement of free agency." – Billy Hunter said recently.
However for the bird rights to take full effect, a player needs to be part of a particular team for at least some or all of the two previous seasons. According to the new collective bargaining agreement, a player reserves his right
if he changes teams due to a trade but the argument the Players Association is trying to make is that if a player is waived off by their previous teams, they should be able to reserve their rights in that case as well.
July 1st is the date when all four of these players all contract less with their respective organizations and if the ruling comes in favour of the union, it would mean that these players would be allowed to resign with
their teams.
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