I know it's more than a couple years away but I thought this was worth talking about now.
“There are a whole lot of reasons why this kind of planning should already be underway,” Grantham said. “Management clearly has started their planning—they are putting forth their manpower, their resources, into the next negotiations. For the union, it is a matter of catching up, and the problem is, even when they do catch up, there is the problem of not having as much stability or experience.”
Here’s how the agent puts it: “We know the storm is coming. It looks like we won’t get the raincoats until the day it arrives.”
link
Obviously a lot can happen in 3 years but it's interesting that neither side has seemed to really have learned much from last time.
So it may be premature to mention this, but hidden in the details of the league’s day-to-day business in recent months has been this fact: The groundwork is already being laid for another lockout.
That is the consensus among league executives and prominent agents. But it is articulated particularly well by Charles Grantham, who worked for the union from 1978-’95, serving as its executive director for the last seven of those years (he left a year before Billy Hunter, who was deposed last year amid scandal, took over). No replacement for Hunter has been named, and that’s just one element feeding lockout fears.
if new NBA commissioner Adam Silver began working on the next CBA just after the last deal was signed, that puts the union more than two years behind. Chris Paul was only named union president in August of 2013, and the field of candidates for executive director was only narrowed to two last month.
But in order for the players to be working on these kinds of strategies, they need a director.
“There are a whole lot of reasons why this kind of planning should already be underway,” Grantham said. “Management clearly has started their planning—they are putting forth their manpower, their resources, into the next negotiations. For the union, it is a matter of catching up, and the problem is, even when they do catch up, there is the problem of not having as much stability or experience.”
Here’s how the agent puts it: “We know the storm is coming. It looks like we won’t get the raincoats until the day it arrives.”
link
Obviously a lot can happen in 3 years but it's interesting that neither side has seemed to really have learned much from last time.