The news we were hoping to avoid has come out. ESPN’s Ric Bucher is reporting that the NBA has moved to postpone the start of training camp and some preseason games that take place in October. This moves comes after a meeting today in which no progress towards a new CBA was made. This almost guarantees that the NBA will indeed miss some regular season games this year.
September 22, 2011 3:24 pm via Mobile WebReplyRetweetFavorite
The writing was on the wall for this a long time. It’s sad to see as the NBA has approached levels of popularity that it has never seen before. There are numerous young superstars and budding rivalries all across the league. Just this past year, we saw the Miami Heat become the biggest villains in sport, Dirk Nowitzki finally win a ring, and Derrick Rose become the youngest MVP in history. Just like that, all of this is put on hold. The sad thing is, the players can do nothing about it anymore. They are the ones locked out, but it’s not about them.
This comes down to owners versus owners. The big-market owners against the small-market ones. Jerry Buss, Jim Dolan, and Jerry Reinsdorf against Glen Taylor, Robert Sarver, and Dan Gilbert. The big owners want the league to resume ASAP in order to keep their revenue stream up. The small owners want to crush the players in order to protect themselves from losing money. David Stern is caught in between. It doesn’t help the owners leading the charge to extend the lockout might be the most incompetent people on the planet. Gilbert was all in favor of a soft salary cap while LeBron James played in Cleveland. Now that LeBron is gone, he wants a hard salary cap to keep his team on equal footing.
It’s going to be a long winter without the NBA. As a diehard, I’m truly disappointed. I love the NBA and it’s hard to see it vanish because some owners have the brain power of a lab rat. Hopefully we get some NBA this year. I can live with a 50 game season. Just bring it back as soon as possible.
