NBA Officials, Players See Another Lockout as a Possibility

By: Dwain Price
Posted In: Sports

Now that the NHL is involved in a lockout, could the NBA be next?

The Collective Bargaining Agreement signed six years ago by the NBA Players Association and NBA expires June 30. Early talks have not produced any substantial headway, leading many to brace for another lockout.

“We are having ongoing discussions with the players’ association,” said Russ Granik, the NBA deputy commissioner. “But no announcement is imminent regarding an agreement.”

One of the main sticking points is that the owners want the players to give up six- and seven-year guaranteed contracts in favor of three- or four-year guarantees. The owners also want to increase the luxury-tax rates for high-spending teams and lower the tax threshold.

Players want to maintain the long-term guaranteed contract format, loosen the trade rules and institute lower tax and escrow thresholds.

“If the owners don’t come off their high demands, I believe we might be headed for another lockout,” said Billy Hunter, the union’s president. “But I hope it doesn’t come to that.”

Players hope the sides can reach an agreement and avoid a lockout like the one that lasted 190 days and shortened the 1998-99 season by 32 games.

“I don’t think the players are willing to go through the things that we went through in 1998,” Houston Rockets center Dikembe Mutombo said. “Between the league and the union, I don’t think we want to put the game in jeopardy like hockey did.”

But is the NBA courting yet another disaster?

“Hopefully, we can get something settled with the owners and we don’t get locked out,” Rockets guard Tracy McGrady said. “We’re going to push for what we really want, and if they disagree, then it might come to that situation.”

NHL owners locked out players last month, and the games might not resume until January- or next season. Mavericks owner Mark Cuban said he hoped the NHL would have learned from what happened to the NBA in 1998- and the NBA learns from what’s currently happening to the NHL.

“The NBA system is not perfect by a long shot,” Cuban said. “The previous (CBA) deal was not perfect by a long shot, so hopefully the NHL will take the good things about it and improve on the bad things.

“I can tell you that hockey’s kind of taking the bullet for us right now.”

Cuban has some words of advice for the NBA as the CBA contract winds down.

“What the NBA can learn from 1998 was that it’s a whole different environment (today), and it’s a whole different universe,” Cuban said. “And we need to start with a clean slate rather than trying to work from 1998 as a prototype.

“I’ve got some very definite opinions on how I think things should work, so we’ll see how it all plays out.”

If the 2005-06 season is shortened by 32 games, Mavs forward Michael Finley would lose $6.22 million of the $15.94 million he would earn next season.

“Nobody wants to go through what we did in 1998,” Finley said. “But we’ve got to do what’s best for us as players.”

Miami Heat guard Dwyane Wade, who is coming off a stellar rookie season, isn’t thrilled at the prospect of the owners locking out the players before the start of the 2005-06 season.

“My only thought is I hope we can come to an agreement,” Wade said. “But we need to make sure we save our money and be smart, because you never know what can happen.”

Rockets forward Jim Jackson hopes the players don’t panic and vote for a bad deal.

“If anything happens, we as players are going to have to stick together the whole duration and not for just a short period of time,” Jackson said. “I don’t know what to expect right now, but we as players have to do what we’ve got to do to make sure that the pot is spread equally.”

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c 2004, Fort Worth Star-Telegram.

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Distributed by Knight Ridder/Tribune Information Services.