NBA owners and NBPA officials meet for 12 hours; Will reconvene again on Thursday noon
The NBA labour dispute dragged on for yet another day as owners and players met once more in Manhattan, New York.
The meeting continued well into the night and extended for a total of 12 hours, but once again the two sides failed to resolve their disputes. However, they have decided to meet again on Thursday, Novemeber10, to try and bring
the lockout to an end.
After the meeting NBA Commissioner David Stern revealed that he stopped the clock on the Wednesday 5 P.M. deadline he had issued earlier. According to the ultimatum given by the owners, players had till Wednesday to accept a new
Collective Bargaining Agreement (CBA) which would give them a 50-50 share of the Basketball Related Income (BRI).
If the players failed to do so, Stern vowed to return to the 47-53 proposal, which would also mean salary rollbacks and a hard cap.
After the marathon meeting, Stern said there wasn’t too much to read into at the moment, as talks remained long drawn and differences continued to hinder progress.
"I would not read into this optimism or pessimism," he said. "We're not failing. We're not succeeding. We're just there."
For their part, the players rejected the 50-50 split proposal outright, but requested a meeting with the owners anyway to try and find an alternative way out. Some in National Basketball Players Association have already demanded
a decertification so that they can sue the league in a federal court, but the union as a whole is still persisting with talks.
"We can't say there was significant progress today," Derek Fisher, President of the NBPA said. "We'll be back tomorrow ... and we'll see if we can continue to make the efforts at least to finish this out."
The players have reportedly proposed a new mechanism for BRI split, which will give them 51 percent, plus 1 percent for the retired professionals. The owners’ last proposal stood between 49 to 51 percent, the players claiming it
was 50.2 percent max.
Salary cap issues also remain. The league had originally proposed a hard cap and they have more or less got their wish by excessive penalties on anyone that crosses a pre-set threshold of spending on wages. The union wants those
rules waved for free agents, who they insist should be able to join any team they want.
They are also pushing for a higher floor in veteran contracts. If the owners do not yield some concessions, the hard line players and agents could get their wish and the union could be headed for a decertification.
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