Final Project

The NBA Is Back…….Finally

By: Larry Edwards, December 5, 2011

            November 26 will now be remembered as the day that the NBA players and owners agreed to a tentative agreement on a new Collective Bargaining Agreement.

            On Saturday, November 26 in the early hours of the morning, NBA owner and players agreed, on hand shake terms, to a new CBA that will allow for the new NBA season to start on Christmas day. The deal still has to go through the ratification process by the players and owners.

            After 149 days of the NBA Lockout, the NBA offseason will begin on Friday, December 9 with training camp starting and the free agency period begins. Free agency courting can begin Monday, but no oral or written agreements can be made because the lockout is still effective, technically.

            Other restrictions included are that the coaches can’t super-vise on court workouts by the players before the beginning of Friday but the coaches are able to start giving physical exams to see where their players are.

            NBA Commissioner David Stern and the NBAPA executive director Billy Hunter are still tuning up the fine points of the new tentative labor agreement and are set to continue Monday. With that, the league is hoping to have to deal ready to present to the executive negotiating committees of both sides. The players and owners will have vote electronically at separate time Thursday, keeping the timeline for training camp on Friday to begin. Hunter sent a letter to all players saying that the owners and NBAPA "still must negotiate numerous non-economic matters, including the anti-drug agreement, commissioner and team discipline, and workplace rules, together with relatively smaller economic and other contract issues."

            The players agreed that allowed them to receive between 49 to 51 percent of all basketball related income, or BRI, which is down from the previous number of 57 percent. Over the ten year agreement, the owners will regain at least $3 billion.

            The league is planning a 66-game season that will begin December 25, Christmas Day, with a five game schedule. The games to take place on Christmas will be Boston Celtics at New York Knicks, Miami Heat at Dallas Mavericks, Chicago Bulls at Los Angeles Lakers, Orlando Magic at Oklahoma City Thunder and Los Angeles Clippers at Golden State Warriors.  The Memphis Grizzlies will not begin regular season play on Christmas even though the league was looking at pairing them and the Oklahoma City in a second round Western Conference playoff rematch.

            The new collective bargaining agreement will be ten years and can last until the year 2022, with the owners or players being able to opt-out after the sixth year. Since the new deal being worked out seems to favor the owners, the players would most likely be the ones to decide to opt-out to negotiate and new deal of the two sides.

            In the revenue split, the players will receive 51.15 percent of the basketball related income in the 2011-2012 NBA season. The players will then get 49 to 51 percent of the BRI in the later years with 1 percent of that going to post-career benefits. This can be considered as a win for the owners. With all of the money lost in previous seasons due to the old CBA, the owners got a reset of the NBA’s economic system. Also the players will lose around 20 percent of their salaries for the upcoming season because of all the games lost.

            Another detail that was changed from the previous CBA is the amnesty provision. The new provision allows teams to waive players prior to the start of the season without the player’s salary impacting the team’s luxury tax or salary cap. But it only allows a team to get of one player and their contracts though. Teams that have overpaid on a player and given him a bad contract have benefited from this the most. By waiving that player a large number of money will be freed and the team can look elsewhere to fill that void.

            The other big issue that was to be addressed was the revenue sharing. The exact plans for this portion of the agreement have not been finalized yet, but it was addressed to benefit smaller market teams. The plan is to make big name markets that get large sums of money and share that with smaller market teams. Teams like the Los Angeles Lakers and the Miami Heat will be big payers to teams like the Minnesota Timberwolves and Memphis Grizzlies.

            The players have also benefited with new requirements for the minimum team salary. The teams must spend at least 85 percent this season and 90 percent in later years. With that said, now teams have to pay the players more amounts of money to fill the minimum team salary.

            “I’m happy for the people — the workers and the fans of the game.Iit’s great. We’re ready to go back to the things we love,” said Zach Randolph, power forward for the Memphis Grizzlies, when asked about the new CBA agreement.

Additional Details:

The annual NBA All-Star game will still take place in Orlando but will be pushed back to a different date.

Both owners and players will need a majority vote in order for he agreement to be ratified and put in place.