If a soft cap remains. There needs to be HUGE penalties for going over the cap (like 2 for 1 dollars).

I just fear that NBA basketball is entering MLB territory. Where 20 teams know that they have no chance each and every year.

“Stern said the players’ revised concept ‘gave us some ideas,’ but did not result in any discussion about whether owners were willing to move off their insistence on a $45 million hard cap. There remains a ‘very substantial gap’ between the two negotiation positions, Stern said. ”

Most (or almost all) of the optimism was coming from the union – Hunter & Mason – and that should be put in the context of the owners & Stern being relatively quiet on the subject.

http://ken-berger.blogs.cbssports.com/mcc/blogs/entry/11838893/29729191

(hat tip to UB for posting in PD)

The idea there is that with looser trade restrictions, teams would find it easier to dump bad contracts. On the other hand, as the Berger article notes, this might just encourage owners to sign even more bad contracts, which kinds of defeats the purpose.

On money vs structure

I think I agree with Tim that the structure does matter a lot to the owners (though I don’t agree with the owners). If the structure weren’t important, the negotiation could have been done on the basis of the 2005 CBA, with most of the haggling on the BRI split and some hardening of the cap (dropping the MLE, eliminating S&T, lower yearly increments, etc) + more revenue sharing. This is the approach I would have favored, and I think negotiations would have been far smoother on this basis.

The owners make 3 demands that are non-starters for the players, I think. These are 1) The hard cap; 2) Rollbacks on existing contracts; and 3) Reduced guarantees on all contracts. All the other demands (e.g. contract length, increments, etc), I think the players are willing to negotiate on.

Of those 3 demands, the only one that I think is important is the partial guarantees, though obviously Tim disagrees. I think if the owners really push it, they could get the players to accept one of these non-starters. Trying for all three though… well, I see a long lockout coming.

It’s interesting that Stern is still keeping up a conciliatory tone despite the players’ labor complaint tactic. Maybe they are serious about trying to get a negotiation done. But yeah, their positions look miles apart yet.

I have a question about the trade percentage increase in the players proposal. Does it really double (from 125% to 250%)? That seems absurd.

I also agree with getting rid of “max” contracts, though I’m a big hard cap proponent.

From a fan’s perspective, I’m surprised no one has said anything about eliminating “max” contracts. Even under soft cap, I doubt Lebron, Wade, and Bosh would have got together, if they could make 25-30 Million on separate teams.