Tag: San Antonio Spurs

Stern details specifics of ultimatum in letter

By Howard Beck, New York Times

NEW YORK — The ultimatum issued by the NBA to its players over the weekend not only threatens them with a worse labor deal but also a massive pay cut if they do not make a deal by Wednesday afternoon.

A letter sent by David Stern, the commissioner of the NBA, to the players union Sunday contrasts the proposal on the table — highlighted by a 50-50 split of revenues — with a “reset” proposal that would cut the players’ share to 47 percent, roll back current contracts, impose a hard salary cap and reduce contract lengths.

The salary rollback, which was part of the NBA’s first controversial proposal in 2010, had not been included in any league proposal for many months, and it was not publicly mentioned by Stern when he announced the ultimatum Saturday.

But the rollback was included in the letter Stern sent to Billy Hunter, the union’s executive director. A copy of the letter was obtained by the New York Times.

The union has until 5 p.m. Wednesday to accept the NBA’s last proposal or have it replaced by the reset proposal, Stern wrote.

The NBA’s current proposal to the players includes a soft salary cap, a 50 percent share of revenues for players and these features:

• Salary-cap and luxury-tax levels in Years 1 and 2 of the new agreement will be no less than they were in 2010-11. By Year 3, they will be adjusted downward to conform to the new system.

• Sign-and-trade deals and the biannual exception will be available only to nontaxpaying teams.

• Extend-and-trade deals, like the one signed by Carmelo Anthony last season, won’t be allowed.

• The midlevel exception will be set at $5 million for nontaxpaying teams, with a maximum length between three and four years (alternating annually). The value of the exception will grow by 3 percent annually, starting in Year 3.

• The midlevel exception will be set at $2.5 million for taxpaying teams, with a maximum length of two years, and cannot be used in consecutive years.

• A 10 percent escrow tax will be withheld from player salaries, to ensure that player earnings do not exceed 50 percent of league revenues.

• Maximum contract lengths will be five years for “Bird” free agents and four years for others.

• Players will be paid a prorated share of their 2011-12 salaries, based on games played once the season starts.

• Team and player contract options will be prohibited in new contracts, other than rookie deals. But a player can opt out of the final year of a contract if he agrees to zero salary protection (i.e., if it is nonguaranteed).

The “reset” proposal features a flex-cap system that contains an absolute salary ceiling — to be set $5 million above the average team salary. In addition, the NBA would roll back existing contracts “in proportion to system changes in order to ensure sufficient market for free agents.”

Some of the other major differences in the “reset” proposal:

• The midlevel exception would be set at $3 million in Year 1, with a maximum length of three years, and would grow at 3 percent annually.

• Maximum salaries would be reduced.

• Contracts would be limited to four years for “Bird” free agents and three years for others, but each team could give a five-year deal to one designated player.

Both proposals include an “amnesty” provision that will allow every team to waive one player and have 100 percent of his salary removed from the cap.

Source says NBA talks to resume Wednesday

By Brian Mahoney
Associated Press

NEW YORK — Officials from the NBA and players’ association will meet Wednesday, less than a week after three days of talks with a federal mediator couldn’t produce a deal to end the lockout, a person with knowledge of the plans said.

Talks broke down last Thursday after players said owners insisted they agree to a 50-50 split of revenues before they would further discuss the salary cap system. By not reaching an agreement last week, the NBA will likely be forced to cancel more games to go with the two weeks that were already scrapped.

There was a far nastier tone than usual to the breakdown, with union president Derek Fisher of the Lakers accusing Deputy Commissioner Adam Silver and Spurs owner Peter Holt, chairman of the league’s labor relations committee, of lying during their press conference.

But just as they have multiple times this month when they walked away from the table without another meeting scheduled, the sides are getting back at it relatively quickly.

The meeting, first reported by the Daily News of New York, will be small groups from each side, the person told The Associated Press on condition of anonymity because details of the negotiations were to remain private. Commissioner David Stern will take part after he was forced to miss the session last Thursday because of an illness.

Stern said without a deal last week, he feared games could be lost right through Christmas. The sides tried, spending 30 hours together while meeting for three straight days for the first time since the lockout began July 1. They made some progress on minor issues, but continue to be stuck on the two main ones.

Players proposed lowering their guarantee of basketball-related income to 52.5 percent, leaving the sides about $100 million apart annually based on last season’s revenues. They are also sparring over the length of contracts and the raises attached to them, along with the penalties teams would face for exceeding the luxury tax level.

Buck Harvey: Lockout discipline: Elliott as the model

Sean Elliott felt physically fine about a dozen years ago. The NBA’s opening night was cancelled, just as it is tonight, but Elliott kept working to stay ready.

“I was anticipating some type of season,” he said Monday.

He got some type of season, all right. The lockout crunched 50 games into three months. Then, in March of that shortened 1999 season, Elliott’s kidneys began to fail.

He not only survived, he did so while playing all the way to the Finals. And that’s why he thinks a compacted season is not only tolerable for today’s players, it will also be telling of them.

“We will see who is serious about it,” Elliott said. “And who has been out there messing around.”

Elliott reports his health remains good. Monday was the birthday of his brother and organ donor, Noel. And asked if he told his kidney “happy birthday,” Sean laughed.

“Every year,” he said.

He’d been living with his old, weakened kidneys long before that championship season. Gregg Popovich was able to swap a mid-first-round draft pick in 1994 to get Elliott back, in part, because Elliott was viewed as damaged.

But the weakening of his kidneys had seemingly leveled off. By 1998, when another lockout began to cut into the season, Elliott didn’t see them as an issue. He was more concerned with a labor fight more divisive than this one.

“We weren’t talking then like they are now,” he said. “That’s why I’m more optimistic this time.”

Then, Elliott was coming off consecutive seasons of knee surgeries. So he stayed in the gym, determined to come back strong.

The kidneys? A preseason physical said Elliott’s renal functions were stable.

But sometime in March, with no explanation, his kidneys began to quickly deteriorate. Elliott told just a few people, among them Popovich and teammate Steve Kerr, and kept playing.

The schedule wasn’t easy for those not facing an organ transplant. Robert Horry, then a Laker, remembers being so exhausted after playing three games in three nights that he fell against his hotel room wall. That season, he said recently, “cut my career by a year.”

There were times, too, when Elliott wasn’t the same. There was a mental side to his fatigue; he was too aware something inside wasn’t right.

In recent years, he’s watched tape of that season, and some stretches were startling. He saw himself laying on screens, unable to get into position.

“I told Pop not long ago,” Elliott said, “‘Thank God you trusted me then.’ Because I wouldn’t have gone with that guy I was seeing.”

Still, Elliott held up. He defended Kobe Bryant in the second round, threw in the Memorial Day Miracle in the next, then chased Latrell Sprewell and Allan Houston in the Finals.

Did it feel like an ordeal at times?

“Oh, yeah,” he said.

As tired as he was in those months, he believes the body of a professional athlete “has an amazing ability to adapt.” He thinks the Spurs got into a rhythm then, just as they sometimes do in other seasons when they come to the rugged part of a schedule.

Furthermore, Elliott says the jammed schedule made him actually better in the postseason. “There aren’t any back-to-backs in the playoffs,” he said. “So you feel like you are exhaling.”

But that’s only for those who were breathing smoothly going into the season. Elliott says the longer this lockout goes, the more this will be about the discipline of the players.

He guesses this: Anywhere from 20 to 30 percent won’t be in shape and will struggle.

And what will their excuse be? That the post-lockout schedule was too demanding?

A dozen years ago, Elliott eliminated that as an excuse.

bharvey@express-news.net