the NBA is a joke - Dwight Howard wants to leave for New York or L.A.

[Triumph36]

So let's say that this past off-season, the Cavs are set up exactly the same as Miami... enough cap space to bring in both Wade and Bosh and still provide a quality supporting cast. Are you honestly suggesting that the Cavs would be on equal footing to bring in DWade and Bosh as the Heat would be to bring in LeBron and Bosh? That's absurd.

That's what I'm saying... two of the teams that improved the most this off-season (Miami and New York) did it by simply unloading assets for nothing and clearing cap space. The option to improve by that method isn't available to every team in the league. You're not going to see a team like Minnesota or Milwaukee bring in Amare and have Melo begging to be sent their way with a roster of mostly garbage. It's only an option for cities attractive to players... they're the only ones who are able to put in franchise pieces through FA.

It's bad enough that the only way for teams like the Cavs to build is through the draft but to lose whoever they get through the draft to these cities regardless of whether or not they build a contender for their player is just crap. That's a competitive imbalance and something I hope gets fixed with this next CBA, both for my own sanity and the sake of the league.

Teams are never going to be on equal footing. Cleveland may be a better option than say, Indianapolis while Los Angeles or New York would be a better option than Miami. It just depends on who you are "competing" against. Cleveland would lose to Miami. But if Cleveland were the only team with enough space, the trio likely wouldn't pass because it's Cleveland.

How is the NBA going to fix it? Put a clause in the CBA that states "a team playing in a top x market is not permitted to clear cap space in hopes of signing multiple free agents?" That's not possible.

 

[Spectre]

Gain ground? The NFL is far, far more popular than the NBA. The super bowl had a 47.9 rating and was the most watched TV show ever. By comparison, game 7 of last year's NBA finals had a rating of 18.2.

I know and it should be. However, if you think that's disparity, wait until stars pull a LeBron on a regular basis and only big cities contend. Compare that to a sport where any single team can turn things around in just a year... it's like night and day.

 

[ButterMPancakes]

On the same topic, it's kind of funny how everyone is outraged by this but if Cleveland were one of the "attractive cities" or the Cavs had just signed 3 stars, it wouldn't be a problem at all.

I've only seen RCF complain about this "generation" and its "problems" after LeBron signed with Wade and Bosh. . . really, players have been leaving for better places and demanding trades for years and years. . . it's only a problem to those that lose their stars. Shaq leaving to LA was never much of a problem outside of Orlando, TMAC, Carter, and Kobe's demands for trades are barely even talked about nowadays.


While it sucks that Miami will be ridiculous for a few years, it doesn't mean players shouldn't try to compete with them. If in 2 years Orlando has no cap space and a roster of 30+ years old Hedo, Arenas, and Nelson, why should Howard really be criminalized for leaving? I'd be really bummed out but I can understand it completely.

The other thing I don't understand is how fans demand utter loyalty from their superstars and superstars only. The superstars that they drafted should stay with the team forever. . . and the not-so talented players that they're not happy with should be traded ASAP!!


As far as using Tim Duncan as an example, I'm not sure it works. . . Timmy had already won rings with San Antonio and they had a pretty bright future.

Durant, well that's not even a good example. . . Durant signed an extension much like Howard and even LeBron did. . . At the end of his contract he'll have 8 years with the Thunder, the same amount of years Howard signed for with the Magic. Let's wait until 2016 before talking about Durant being the perfect role model. If that team wins no championships until 2016 and have no bright future, we'll see just how "loyal" Durant is.




Oh yeah, and again, Howard never said anything about leaving. . . this story holds about as much water as Gortat's hands (I was going to say Hickson's but I don't want to piss off any Cavs fans :chuckles)

 

[Spectre]

Teams are never going to be on equal footing. Cleveland may be a better option than say, Indianapolis while Los Angeles or New York would be a better option than Miami. It just depends on who you are "competing" against. Cleveland would lose to Miami. But if Cleveland were the only team with enough space, the trio likely wouldn't pass because it's Cleveland.

How is the NBA going to fix it? Put a clause in the CBA that states "a team playing in a top x market is not permitted to clear cap space in hopes of signing multiple free agents?" That's not possible.

I understand the big cities will always have an advantage but what's important is to try to at least protect the smaller market teams if they do end up drafting well enough to land a superstar. Make it harder for players to hit free agency or give some kind of compensation for losing key free agents. The NFL uses the franchise tag and it works well enough... even players who don't want to stay and want out eventually force a trade which nets a good amount of assets in return for the trading team. The league also offers compensatory picks for losing players (which granted, would be tougher to do in the NBA because of how top heavy drafts are). The NBA doesn't even guarantee the top pick of the draft to the worst team. Until something changes, things like the stunt LeBron pulled will only become more prevalent.

 

[Chris]

I've only seen RCF complain about this "generation" and its "problems" after LeBron signed with Wade and Bosh. . . really, players have been leaving for better places and demanding trades for years and years. . . it's only a problem to those that lose their stars. Shaq leaving to LA was never much of a problem outside of Orlando, TMAC, Carter, and Kobe's demands for trades are barely even talked about nowadays.


While it sucks that Miami will be ridiculous for a few years, it doesn't mean players shouldn't try to compete with them. If in 2 years Orlando has no cap space and a roster of 30+ years old Hedo, Arenas, and Nelson, why should Howard really be criminalized for leaving? I'd be really bummed out but I can understand it completely.

The other thing I don't understand is how fans demand utter loyalty from their superstars and superstars only. The superstars that they drafted should stay with the team forever. . . and the not-so talented players that they're not happy with should be traded ASAP!!


As far as using Tim Duncan as an example, I'm not sure it works. . . Timmy had already won rings with San Antonio and they had a pretty bright future.

Durant, well that's not even a good example. . . Durant signed an extension much like Howard and even LeBron did. . . At the end of his contract he'll have 8 years with the Thunder, the same amount of years Howard signed for with the Magic. Let's wait until 2016 before talking about Durant being the perfect role model. If that team wins no championships until 2016 and have no bright future, we'll see just how "loyal" Durant is.




Oh yeah, and again, Howard never said anything about leaving. . . this story holds about as much water as Gortat's hands (I was going to say Hickson's but I don't want to piss off any Cavs fans :chuckles)

You make good points but in the end, we're fans. We don't like seeing 3-4 superstars on one team. Not fun at all.

 

[Mdog1]

The way you guys are talking you want the NBA to set up a system like this;

Hard Cap,
One maximum contract per team,
two secondary contracts per team (20% less than maximum contract),
Capped contracts for role players.

So for example the hard cap is 69 million. The maximum contract is 15 million (one player, 15 million total), the secondary contracts are 12 million (three players and 39 million total), role players capped at 3 million each (13 players and 69 million total).

In this example let's just take the Lakers, Kobe is the star, Gasol/Bynum are the secondaries and then everyone else is a role player. If this were to happen then the NBA would finally be a competetive league as it would stop teams from signing LeBron, Wade and Bosh for the same amount of money. Sure they could still do it theoretically, but would LeBron really have been ok with making less money than Wade? I'm not so sure on that one personally.

 

[ButterMPancakes]

You make good points but in the end, we're fans. We don't like seeing 3-4 superstars on one team. Not fun at all.

Really though, there's only one team with more than 1 superstar and that's Miami. . . New York would have two top tier All-Stars in Melo and Amar'e and the Thunder are shaping two of them in Westbrook and Durant. That's it, though. . .


and to be honest, I would rather see teams building to be able to compete against Miami than every single city with a superstar/all-star but with no chance of ever challenging the Heat. . . it's well known amongst fans and players that you can't win it all alone unless you're Hakeem and it's 1994. If a player wants to win a title he should know he'll need another star next to him.


As long as players play out their contracts, I don't see what the problem is. Management should also be held accountable. Should superstars also have to put up with crappy management and futile attempts at making the team better?

 

[SauDogg]

I agree that the current mentality of this generation's players sucks. And the superstars have too much power over where they go.

 

[Triumph36]

I understand the big cities will always have an advantage but what's important is to try to at least protect the smaller market teams if they do end up drafting well enough to land a superstar. Make it harder for players to hit free agency or give some kind of compensation for losing key free agents. The NFL uses the franchise tag and it works well enough... even players who don't want to stay and want out eventually force a trade which nets a good amount of assets in return for the trading team. The league also offers compensatory picks for losing players (which granted, would be tougher to do in the NBA because of how top heavy drafts are). The NBA doesn't even guarantee the top pick of the draft to the worst team. Until something changes, things like the stunt LeBron pulled will only become more prevalent.

Franchise tags would give owners that, restricted free agency, AND bird rights. That's way too much. Not to mention NFL rosters are far, far bigger than NBA rosters. It'd have to be adjusted, perhaps to something like the BAE, where a team gets a franchise tag every other year or something. Or maybe only allow it to be used on a certain player once in their career. Given how small the rosters are and how talent-heavy they are at the top, giving a team a franchise tag every year and allowing them to tag the same player in consecutive years just wouldn't be fair to a player.

If it is something like the team gets it every other year, that doesn't really stop what happened from happening again. LBJ/Bosh would both be franchise tagged for the 2010/2011 season and then just join Wade in Miami for the 2011/2012 season.

 

[PIP]

I've only seen RCF complain about this "generation" and its "problems" after LeBron signed with Wade and Bosh. . . really, players have been leaving for better places and demanding trades for years and years. . . it's only a problem to those that lose their stars. Shaq leaving to LA was never much of a problem outside of Orlando, TMAC, Carter, and Kobe's demands for trades are barely even talked about nowadays.


While it sucks that Miami will be ridiculous for a few years, it doesn't mean players shouldn't try to compete with them. If in 2 years Orlando has no cap space and a roster of 30+ years old Hedo, Arenas, and Nelson, why should Howard really be criminalized for leaving? I'd be really bummed out but I can understand it completely.

The other thing I don't understand is how fans demand utter loyalty from their superstars and superstars only. The superstars that they drafted should stay with the team forever. . . and the not-so talented players that they're not happy with should be traded ASAP!!


As far as using Tim Duncan as an example, I'm not sure it works. . . Timmy had already won rings with San Antonio and they had a pretty bright future.

Durant, well that's not even a good example. . . Durant signed an extension much like Howard and even LeBron did. . . At the end of his contract he'll have 8 years with the Thunder, the same amount of years Howard signed for with the Magic. Let's wait until 2016 before talking about Durant being the perfect role model. If that team wins no championships until 2016 and have no bright future, we'll see just how "loyal" Durant is.




Oh yeah, and again, Howard never said anything about leaving. . . this story holds about as much water as Gortat's hands (I was going to say Hickson's but I don't want to piss off any Cavs fans :chuckles)

It's not so much about them leaving as it is about them trying to not only manufacture their own success, but to also try to make the field unbalanced... Creating "super teams" is more of the issue than anything... I don't have a problem with the Heat franchise-- it's not like they're the Lakers... Hell, like Chicago in 2000, when Miami had a ton of cap space a decade ago they weren't able to attract talent--it was Orlando at that time...

Shaq leaving for LA was huge back in the day, but it's not like he went to the Sonics to team up with Payton and Kemp or went to the Bulls or anything.... This kinda reminded me of Barkley looking to team up with Drexler and Hakeem--though all 3 were past their primes...

My problem with the whole thing is trying to manufacture the success and their ultimate destiny... It just seems tainted a bit to me and doesn't carry the same weight as something like the Spurs have done or the Bulls have done etc... There's something off about it..Kinda seems video game-ish....

LeBron never said anything about leaving either.... When I saw the headlines this morning of: "Sources close to Dwight" it brought back a lot of dejavu...:chuckles:

Dwight watch is on...

 

[Triumph36]

The way you guys are talking you want the NBA to set up a system like this;

Hard Cap,
One maximum contract per team,
two secondary contracts per team (20% less than maximum contract),
Capped contracts for role players.

So for example the hard cap is 69 million. The maximum contract is 15 million (one player, 15 million total), the secondary contracts are 12 million (three players and 39 million total), role players capped at 3 million each (13 players and 69 million total).

In this example let's just take the Lakers, Kobe is the star, Gasol/Bynum are the secondaries and then everyone else is a role player. If this were to happen then the NBA would finally be a competetive league as it would stop teams from signing LeBron, Wade and Bosh for the same amount of money. Sure they could still do it theoretically, but would LeBron really have been ok with making less money than Wade? I'm not so sure on that one personally.

And how in the world does the league, with contracts extending years into the future, transition into this? And how are draft picks treated? Something like this just isn't really possible. It'd certainly jack up the % of players who go broke after their playing careers though.

Some sort of hard cap could potentially work, but not something like this.

 

[ButterMPancakes]

It's not so much about them leaving as it is about them trying to not only manufacture their own success, but to also try to make the field unbalanced... Creating "super teams" is more of the issue than anything... I don't have a problem with the Heat franchise-- it's not like they're the Lakers... Hell, like Chicago in 2000, when Miami had a ton of cap space a decade ago they weren't able to attract talent--it was Orlando at that time...

Shaq leaving for LA was huge back in the day, but it's not like he went to the Sonics to team up with Payton and Kemp or went to the Bulls or anything.... This kinda reminded me of Barkley looking to team up with Drexler and Hakeem--though all 3 were past their primes...

My problem with the whole thing is trying to manufacture the success and their ultimate destiny... It just seems tainted a bit to me and doesn't carry the same weight as something like the Spurs have done or the Bulls have done etc... There's something off about it..Kinda seems video game-ish....

LeBron never said anything about leaving either.... When I saw the headlines this morning of: "Sources close to Dwight" it brought back a lot of dejavu...:chuckles:

Dwight watch is on...

I think the only difference here is that 15+ years ago GMs were the ones able to create super teams while today GMs don't seem to be as lucky as well as good teams not having the lottery odds teams back then had. . . now instead of GMs creating super teams you have players doing it. . .


the league fixed the problem of the lottery, so less teams have the chance to get more than one stud (unless you completely luck out and tank like the Thunder), I wouldn't doubt it that with the next CBA it eliminates teams from being able to sign more than one max player, lessening the chances of two superstars joining forces. It might have to take a few years for it to eventually sort itself out but GMs will also have to be held accountable for building crappy teams, trading away their stars, and drafting busts (although this one is really more luck than anything)

 

[Mdog1]

And how in the world does the league, with contracts extending years into the future, transition into this? And how are draft picks treated? Something like this just isn't really possible. It'd certainly jack up the % of players who go broke after their playing careers though.

Some sort of hard cap could potentially work, but not something like this.

I know it couldn't work. The players would never agree to that and likely the players would jsut go to Euroleague or something. But it jsut seems that is what would make RCF happy. My personal preference (if you care) would be to have a combination of the NHL's, NBA's nd NFL's salary cap structures. I like the hard cap in the NHL, I like the non guaranteed in the NFL and I like the RFA's in the NBA. You hard cap the teams and make every contract the exact same starting (let's just say 500k) with performance based pay increasers so that teams are not stuck with Eddy Curry or Zach Randolph type of deals. So let's just say that player A signs with the Cavs and puts up a stat line of 10(points)/10(boards)/3(ast)/2(blk)/1(stl), his contract is 500k plus his performance incentives (that would be the same for the entire league) and we'll say those stats get him 6 million. Player B is on the Cavs and is a 30/8/8/1/1 guy and he gets 500k plus the performance incentives say 14 million.

If that makes sense to you like it does to me, that is what I would like to see. And if a guy isn't playing the way you expected you can cut him because the contracts are non guaranteed. It makes every year a contract year. Oh well I am dreaming I guess as there has always been bad contracts and there always will be.

 

[ButterMPancakes]

I know it couldn't work. The players would never agree to that and likely the players would jsut go to Euroleague or something. But it jsut seems that is what would make RCF happy. My personal preference (if you care) would be to have a combination of the NHL's, NBA's nd NFL's salary cap structures. I like the hard cap in the NHL, I like the non guaranteed in the NFL and I like the RFA's in the NBA. You hard cap the teams and make every contract the exact same starting (let's just say 500k) with performance based pay increasers so that teams are not stuck with Eddy Curry or Zach Randolph type of deals. So let's just say that player A signs with the Cavs and puts up a stat line of 10(points)/10(boards)/3(ast)/2(blk)/1(stl), his contract is 500k plus his performance incentives (that would be the same for the entire league) and we'll say those stats get him 6 million. Player B is on the Cavs and is a 30/8/8/1/1 guy and he gets 500k plus the performance incentives say 14 million.

If that makes sense to you like it does to me, that is what I would like to see. And if a guy isn't playing the way you expected you can cut him because the contracts are non guaranteed. It makes every year a contract year. Oh well I am dreaming I guess as there has always been bad contracts and there always will be.

The problem is that this gives GMs way too much power. . . part of being an NBA General Manager is being able to evaluate a player and make the right offer. If a GM offers Rudy Gay the max contract because they expect him to put up 25/5/5 on 45%+ shooting, that's their own doing. . .


there are too many awful GMs in the league to be giving them the ability to always just snap their mistakes away. They have to "suffer" from their mistakes as well.

 

[Kouki]

I'm sure this has been posted many times before but...

The problem isn't the big markets...New York has been terrible, for example, for a while now....Boston has a long dry spell...LA is generally always competitive but they do have a good owner...Chicago has been pretty bad since Jordan...etc.

The problem is that basketball players are just a different breed than, say, football players.

Football players want to beat the shit out of their opponents.

Basketball players want to give opponents high fives and a slap on the ass.