National Basketball Association

Fruitless talks make lockout inevitable

Published Jun. 9, 2011 1:00 a.m. ET

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It’s been an NBA Finals to remember, with astronomical TV ratings and two memorable close-outs in the Mavs’ wins by Dirk Nowitzki, one with a torn tendon in a finger, the other as he battled a 101-degree fever and sinus infection. We’ve seen LeBron James at his best and worst, as he tries to take home his first piece of championship jewelry. And let’s not forget Dwyane Wade, who continues to show the world that there are some nights when he takes a backseat to no one, LeBron included.

But off the court? There’s no other way to say it: It’s bombing -- when it comes to the labor talks and prospect of a July 1 lockout.

After two days of talks here, NBA owners and players are still miles apart on reaching a new collective bargaining agreement. In the midst of one of the more entertaining and competitive series in recent years, they’re steaming full-speed ahead toward a lockout.

Owners told the players after Wednesday’s session that if they don’t accept a hard salary cap, along with massive reductions in salaries and the shortening of guaranteed contracts, they’re going to be locked out when the current agreement expires at the end of the month.

Depressing as the news is, it was hardly surprising.

“Obviously, it’s something that we’ve known about for a while, that a lockout is a possibility,’’ Wade said back in Miami before Game 1. “We don’t want to think about it now. But all of us have done our jobs, to make sure if there is one, we’ll be prepared for it. But at this point, the game is at its highest. The game is doing great. We’ve been a part of the most-watched games in NBA history. NBA basketball is in its best (shape) it’s been in a long time. We want to keep that going.’’

But it’s all coming to a halt in a matter of weeks. How long the lockout will last is anyone’s guess. But if you were looking forward to free agency starting on July 1, or you’re a summer-league junkie, you can forget those two staples of the offseason. Barring some 11th-hour settlement, the NBA will have a summer shutdown, at the very least.

At this stage, the two sides are dug in.

“I wouldn’t say there’s been progress,’’ said one league official. “Progress is too strong of a term.’’

The union, meanwhile, says there have been only “baby steps’’ made in the last 18 months.

So at least the two sides agree that they’re nowhere near a settlement.

While they’re spinning their wheels at the bargaining table, pro hoops fans must be wondering if the two sides would actually be stupid enough to shut down the league. Actually, it’s the owners’ call, and a lockout is what a majority of them want because they say they’re bleeding money. It’s the small- and mid-market teams that are driving the lockout train, not the Lakers, Knicks or Bulls. The league expects to lose upwards of $300 million this season, with as many as 22 teams losing money, according to league officials. So they’re ready to sacrifice regular-season games to get sweeping changes in the current economic system.

Even a summer-time lockout flies in the face of the game’s popularity. The 11.1 overnight rating for Game 4, when an ailing Nowitzki pulled the Mavs through to tie the series at 2-2, was the second-highest Game 4 rating in the last seven years. Overall, the Finals have been getting the highest ratings since Lakers-Pistons in 2004.

“We’re frustrated by the lack of movement,’’ said the Lakers’ Derek Fisher, the president of the NBA Players Association, after Wednesday’s bargaining session. “We were hoping that we’d be making more progress by now.’’

Here’s why they’re not. Owners are adamant that they need a hard cap, while players insist they’re not giving up on the current soft cap that allows for teams to go over the cap limit while paying a luxury tax. Owners are demanding that players take a whopping paycut -- $800 million annually in salary and benefits -- while players say the owners should look elsewhere to cut costs. Owners think that five-year maximum deals are too lengthy and costly, while players want no part of three-year max deals that owners are pushing. Owners would love to put an end to guaranteed contracts entirely.

Also, owners want to eliminate the mid-level exception that now pays around $6 million annually and favor more revenue sharing to help the small and mid-market teams. If owners get their way, instead of the game’s top players making $16 million in a season, they’d have to live on around $11 million.

Considering how the NBA took a beating for almost two full seasons, after the 1998 lockout caused a shutdown until February of 1999 and resulted in an abbreviated 50-game season, it’s in both sides' best interest to cut a deal. But owners came to Dallas with their hats in hand. They continue to claim that the current economic system that guarantees players 57 percent of all revenues needs to go.

Players love the current 57/43 split -- one the owners insisted they take in 2005 when this current CBA was drawn up -- and the guaranteed annual raises exceeding 10 percent. But owners claim that times have changed since ’05, with revenues in recent years failing to keep up with costs because of the bad economy, among other factors. So while the NBA has grown into a $4 billion-per-year business, the owners are holding out for a new 50-50 split.

“Costs have risen much faster than revenues over the course of this deal,’’ said Adam Silver, the league’s deputy commissioner. “It’s a broken system.’’

Almost two years after first hearing that claim, players still are not buying it. They counter that the system requires nothing more than some tweaking. That’s why Billy Hunter, the NBA Players Association executive director, said Wednesday that it will be a “difficult struggle’’ to reach a deal in the next few weeks. At least the two sides will be talking, with two meetings scheduled for next week and throughout the rest of the month.

“We don’t want to go down the same road the NFL has gone down,’’ commissioner David Stern said, standing out on the American Airlines Center court, before the Mavs tied the series at 2-2. “We all know the dangers of doing that. It’s not what we want to do. But we may have to go down the road.’’

It’s the road to ruin, and it’s exactly where they’re headed.

Mitch Lawrence covers the NBA for the New York Daily News.