Competitive Balance...

[Diesel]

Competitive Balance will be the end of Free Agency.  The League will do whatever it can to make sure that small market teams are competitive.  This is the last time you see super teams being formed.

 

[Diesel]

OK.  I have had a lot of time to think about it.  I believe in the next CBA, we will see an end of the super teams.   The new talking point is " competitive Balance".  It's all over Sports talk... even Barkley Used it this morning.  The league will do what it needs to do to make every team competitive and to make it worthy of TV time.   The TV 2.5 Billion dollars is why these players are getting these salaries.  Now, the NBA has to find a way to make that Atlanta vs. Sacramento game something that people will want to turn on their televisions to watch.  I used to wonder why they only gave the Bulls, Knicks, Heat, and  Lakers  Nationally televised games.   The answer is viewership.  Those team attract viewers.   That's the product that the NBA sells and it gets paid well for that product.   So the real question is what will the league do to slow the building of Juggernauts that will make the game boring to watch?  I have a thought on how it will happen.

 

1. The Franchise tag will come to basketball.   Sorta like in the NFL, I can see the NBA developing a franchise tag.  So that when a team drafts a super player, they have the means to hold on to him until they can build a worthy team around him.   Here's what it looks like.

Franchise tag can protect a team from losing a player for 1 year.  However, that player will make 30% of the cap.

So like with Durant.  OKC slaps the franchise player tag on Durant.  Automatically, for 1 year, he can't be moved in FAcy.  Moreover, because he has been tagged with the franchise tag, he will make 28.2 Million dollars for 2016 season.  It then becomes a case of record keeping.  For instance,  OKC if they had Durant and Westbrook coming up for Free agency, they can slap the franchise tag on both of them and they both make 28.2 Million.   That means of their 94 Million dollars, they will have spent 56.4 Million on the two of them.

But the franchise tag is only for 1 year and cannot be renewed after that for 4 years (for instance).   That means that in a situation like ours, we could have hit Horf with the Franchise tag, sign Howard or whoever.. and then worked out a trade of Horf during the year if we thought that he was prone to leave. 

2. A rookie Max.   After their 4 years on their first contract, a team can offer a "rookie max".. a 3 yr deal starting at 25% of the cap.   This gives a franchise possibly 7 years with a desired rookie.  The rookie max can be offered as early as the 2nd year into the first contract. 

3.  A New Vet SuperMax Retirement Exemption.    After spending 10 years with the same team, a team can sign a vet to whatever pricetag they want (Supermax) that will be sustained until that player retires and the player only counts 25% against the cap.  The player cannot be traded and the exemption lasts only 10 years.   So let's take Lebron. IF he had spent 10 years with Cleveland.  Cleveland could offer him a 100 Million dollar per year until he retires.  It would only count against the cap say (23.5 Million) this year. 

 

The whole thought behind these new innovations is that it would allow the smaller market teams to hold on to their free agents and stop the superteams. 

 

 

[AHF]

I agree that something needs to be done to address the Super Friends trend in the NBA.  It is wrong on a lot of levels and does not appeal to fans of 28 teams at any given time.

[Admin]

I agree that something needs to be done to address the Super Friends trend in the NBA.  It is wrong on a lot of levels and does not appeal to fans of 28 teams at any given time.

Coming from anyone but a Kentucky fan that would be a valid argument. Super friends is pretty much the recruiting mantra for y'all. Hell I can't even complain about this since I'm a Yankees fan... But at least we wait until free agents are well past their prime to overpay them.

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[Admin]

I really like how the system works in baseball as most teams can now afford to hold onto their stars as long as they want and then when they're older and the player leaves the team gets a 1st round pick and the team signing that star loses one.

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[AHF]

31 minutes ago, Dolfan23 said:

I really like how the system works in baseball as most teams can now afford to hold onto their stars as long as they want and then when they're older and the player leaves the team gets a 1st round pick and the team signing that star loses one.

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It is tough to use a baseball or NFL model wholesale, though, because the drafts in each sport are totally different beasts.  The importance of the first round in the NBA and the top 10 picks in particular so outweighs the rest of the draft it isn't funny.  

In the NBA, you'd rather have the top 20 picks than the field every year.  In MLB or the NFL you'd rather have the field than the top 20 picks and in both those sports there is tremendous value in having a bunch of picks after the top 20.  In the NBA, you hit a saturation point.  

Giving NBA teams a realistic means of holding onto their stars is great for fans as is some way of distributing the top talents rather than picking between $26M on a championship contender, an offer for $26M from a pretender, and an offer of $27M from the hometown team.  Let people actually create a gap in the bids.

[Diesel]

13 hours ago, Dolfan23 said:

I really like how the system works in baseball as most teams can now afford to hold onto their stars as long as they want and then when they're older and the player leaves the team gets a 1st round pick and the team signing that star loses one.

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I think that they can do this in baseball because in baseball the draft is meaningless. 

However, in Basketball, the draft is a difference maker.

However, if you lost a 1st round pick for taking a valued player, how many teams would do it??  My feeling is that it would effect teams like Philly who will be in the lottery anyway.

So the bad teams would become more like farm league teams.. unwilling to give up a pick for a player and the good teams will make that trade everyday.

Maybe there's that place where the bad team has accummulated enough good draft picks that it feels comfortable going after a good player.

[Admin]

I think that they can do this in baseball because in baseball the draft is meaningless. 

However, in Basketball, the draft is a difference maker.

However, if you lost a 1st round pick for taking a valued player, how many teams would do it??  My feeling is that it would effect teams like Philly who will be in the lottery anyway.

So the bad teams would become more like farm league teams.. unwilling to give up a pick for a player and the good teams will make that trade everyday.

Maybe there's that place where the bad team has accummulated enough good draft picks that it feels comfortable going after a good player.

The baseball draft is meaningless? You must not have paid much attention to baseball the past 10 years.

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[Diesel]

After listening to Adam Silver's presser, I think he's about to implement something.   I can easily see a franchise tag and I can see him also using some type of restriction for putting together so many high dollar players.   It's not going to be left up to salary anymore. 

 

[AHF]

43 minutes ago, Diesel said:

After listening to Adam Silver's presser, I think he's about to implement something.   I can easily see a franchise tag and I can see him also using some type of restriction for putting together so many high dollar players.   It's not going to be left up to salary anymore. 

 

There are a lot of ways to address this but the ultimate way it gets addressed is going to be the same:  collective bargaining.  When the CBA re-opens that is Silver's opportunity to address this.  He can't do it without Union agreement.  Some solutions the Union will fight, others they might embrace.  

[Diesel]

3 minutes ago, AHF said:

There are a lot of ways to address this but the ultimate way it gets addressed is going to be the same:  collective bargaining.  When the CBA re-opens that is Silver's opportunity to address this.  He can't do it without Union agreement.  Some solutions the Union will fight, others they might embrace.  

I think based on the split that he's giving the players, they will go for" competitive balance".  Old retired players like Barkley and Jet are already using this term.   It's only going to take a little nudging to the players for them to see that when there is a competitive Balance in the league, the whole league makes money which means that they make money. 

 

[Guest]

There is no competitive balance and they are making boatloads.

[AHF]

1 minute ago, Diesel said:

I think based on the split that he's giving the players, they will go for" competitive balance".  Old retired players like Barkley and Jet are already using this term.   It's only going to take a little nudging to the players for them to see that when there is a competitive Balance in the league, the whole league makes money which means that they make money. 

You can definitely buy competitive balance  but the players want a bigger piece of the pie next CBA.  If they want more to begin with and then you have to trade something for a franchise tag or some other player 'unfriendly' solution then I am not sure what the owners will ultimately decide to do.  If you offer to eliminate max salaries then you take care of it and maybe the players trade you something for that.

[Guest]

On Friday, July 08, 2016 at 6:04 PM, Dolfan23 said:

I really like how the system works in baseball as most teams can now afford to hold onto their stars as long as they want and then when they're older and the player leaves the team gets a 1st round pick and the team signing that star loses one.

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Some form of compensation after losing a free agent seems like a good idea.

I think the only reason this is an issue is the spike in tv money. Absent that, this wouldn't even be an issue.  IOW, after next season i don't think we'll see "super teams".

[Diesel]

22 hours ago, AHF said:

You can definitely buy competitive balance  but the players want a bigger piece of the pie next CBA.  If they want more to begin with and then you have to trade something for a franchise tag or some other player 'unfriendly' solution then I am not sure what the owners will ultimately decide to do.  If you offer to eliminate max salaries then you take care of it and maybe the players trade you something for that.

That's an interesting thought.. but I think one of the things that makes basketball better than the other sports are the guaranteed contracts and the Hard Salary Caps.

So let's say the owners say...

OK.. We will give the NBAPA 60%, we will take 40% of the BRI....  

However, for this deal to go down, we need to enforce Max salaries and We get to have the franchise tag placed on 2  players per team every 4 yrs..  I think that the PA would go for that.

The reason why is this.. .right now, people are starting to argue for Superteams because they feel that the quality of basketball is better.  However, over time, that will create maybe 4 superteams and the other teams will just be seed teams.  TV will only want to watch those 4 teams.  There's 26 teams that will be worthless to watch, follow, or see..  That will kill the brand. (NBA).    You allow those concessions and you will start to develop more balance. 

 

[Diesel]

18 hours ago, kg01 said:

Some form of compensation after losing a free agent seems like a good idea.

I think the only reason this is an issue is the spike in tv money. Absent that, this wouldn't even be an issue.  IOW, after next season i don't think we'll see "super teams".

Once you start making real TV money, you have to develop a way to keep getting it.  "Competitive Balance". 

It's sorta why you can watch the Arizonal Cardinals play on Sunday and again on Thursday of the same week.  People have just grown to expect a thursday night game.. but don't really think about the toll it has on players.  No recovery, no time to gameplan.  Thursday Night football... as implemented has been the worst thing for Football players... I would be willing to bet that you see more injuries after a TNF game than you do for those Sunday games.   That's because when the NFL had the chance to make more money, they took it. 

 

 

[AHF]

48 minutes ago, Diesel said:

That's an interesting thought.. but I think one of the things that makes basketball better than the other sports are the guaranteed contracts and the Hard Salary Caps.

So let's say the owners say...

OK.. We will give the NBAPA 60%, we will take 40% of the BRI....  

However, for this deal to go down, we need to enforce Max salaries and We get to have the franchise tag placed on 2  players per team every 4 yrs..  I think that the PA would go for that.

The reason why is this.. .right now, people are starting to argue for Superteams because they feel that the quality of basketball is better.  However, over time, that will create maybe 4 superteams and the other teams will just be seed teams.  TV will only want to watch those 4 teams.  There's 26 teams that will be worthless to watch, follow, or see..  That will kill the brand. (NBA).    You allow those concessions and you will start to develop more balance. 

 

The players will probably agree to a lot if you pay them 10% more of the BRI.  Will the owners give up 10% of the BRI pie to get franchise tags?  Doubtful.  

I don't think the union will agree to outlaw guaranteed contracts under any circumstance.

[Diesel]

13 hours ago, AHF said:

The players will probably agree to a lot if you pay them 10% more of the BRI.  Will the owners give up 10% of the BRI pie to get franchise tags?  Doubtful.  

I don't think the union will agree to outlaw guaranteed contracts under any circumstance.

It's the bargaining table.  I'm surprised that the owners gave a 50/50 split to begin with... and didn't get much back in return...  So yeah.. I would give up 10% for more control if I were the owners.   Because look at it this way.  If things proceed the way that they are going.. and let's say you're Cuban... You  will eventually have a team (when Dirk's gone) that has no way of winning a championship.   You will either have to make a superteam... or you will have to prepare to lose your fanbase.   IF you lose the fanbase and the fan interest, then your own personal TV contract is gone.  Losing that is just like losing 10% or more.

IF left to go foward unchecked, Superteams will kill the league.

As I rank contracts for players.. I look at it this way:

1. Baseball.

2.  Basketball 

3.  Hockey

4.  Football. 

Basketball's guaranteed contracts are great.   Baseball has probably had higher paid contracts that are guaranteed than all other sports.   

However,  because of the draft and the lack of seed program the NBA is still a step behind. 

Basketball will need to develop a true minor league and find a way to incorporate it in the process of free agency.  To save the game, the franchise tag must be implimented in some way. 

 

[TheNorthCydeRises]

On 7/8/2016 at 4:54 PM, Dolfan23 said:

Coming from anyone but a Kentucky fan that would be a valid argument. Super friends is pretty much the recruiting mantra for y'all. Hell I can't even complain about this since I'm a Yankees fan... But at least we wait until free agents are well past their prime to overpay them.

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LOL .. I 100% agree.

Having said that, every SEC arena goes into a frenzy everytime big, bad UK comes to town.  

The so-called "super teams" are going to RAISE everyone's level of play, even if they do go to the Finals.  This is how it was in the past.

The Lakers in the 80s were a "super team", going to 8 out of 10 NBA Finals in that decade.  Boston made 5 NBA Finals, 4 in a row, during the 80s.

Despite their dominance, teams like Philadelphia, Detroit, Houston, Portland, Dallas, and even your Atlanta Hawks, all raised their level of play during the LA - Boston domination years.

Chicago went to 6 NBA Finals and won them all.  That didn't stop the Knicks and Pacers from fighting to the death to try to beat them.  

And with no dominant team in the West, Portland, Seattle, Phoenix, and Utah had their crack at the Bulls. And in Jordan's hiatus, Houston stepped up and won 2 titles.

Even the Shaq-Kobe Lakers run of 4 out of 5 NBA Finals saw Sacramento, Portland, and San Antonio answer the bell and fight.  And Detroit took them out, and essentially ended the Shaq-Kobe era.

Now we're in the Lebron era, with his 6 straight NBA Finals appearances.

Mark my words, even if Golden State reaches the NBA Finals, it isn't going to be a cakewalk for them.  Unlike the rest of NBA bloggers and talking heads that want to "crown their ass",  teams will rise to the occasion to battle them.

And as much as the rest of the league's fans would hate it ... Cleveland - Golden State III would be EPIC for the popularity of the league.

 

[Thomas]

Kind of weird that the league has gone from David Stern's favorite battle of the Celtics and Lakers to generate the most money to now it being the Cavs and the Warriors. Cleveland was the butt of so much joking in the league for just about forever before LeBron. Remember the roster that had World B. Free and no one else a ways back?