The NBA Players Association on Monday rejected the owners’ latest offer and have launched the process to disband their union, throwing the entire 2011-2012 pro basketball season into jeopardy.
Players had the option to accept the offer, which proposed a shortened 72-game schedule beginning December 15 to end a months-long lockout, or take it to a vote and turn it down altogether.
“This is the best decision for the players,” union president Derek Fisher said Monday.
“A lot of individual players have a lot of things personally at stake in terms of their careers.
“And right now they feel it’s important … that we not only try to get a deal done for today but for the body of NBA players that will come into this league over the next decade and beyond.”
NBA commissioner David Stern had previously warned if the current offer is rejected, the owners would come back with an even harsher one.
“It looks like the 2011-12 season is really in jeopardy,” Stern told ESPN. “It’s just a big charade. To do it now, the union is ratcheting up I guess to see if they can scare the NBA owners or something. That’s not happening.”
But in order for the NBA to have a 72-game season, Stern admitted the two sides would likely have to come to terms on a new collective bargaining agreement within the next week.
The players gave up several billion dollars in salary. The owners wanted the players to give up even more, so boom goes the labor dispute. I find myself unconcerned, maybe it's because there's no NBA team in Cincy, and after the Hornets left Charlotte where I grew up and were replaced with the Bobcats (which to my knowledge have never won a playoff game) I turned to college b-ball instead.
I hope this does get resolved as there's a lot of folks who depend on the NBA for tourism dollars in league cities like Cleveland and Indianapolis. Certainly they don't need to be made to suffer as the millionaire players fight the billionaire owners.
We'll see.
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