The Lockout...

[Sam]

Billy Hunter has said he expects there to be no NBA action at all for the 2011-2012 season.

How long is it gonna last? With both sides risking losing a TON of money, you'd think they'd somehow both be able to find some sort of compromise on things.

[Matt]

I'm pessimistic on this - I think we're going to lose a whole season. The owners' strategy seems to be to keep it going until the players get desperate and have to take huge salary reductions.

What I'd like to know is how much money the owners are going to lose by not having a season?

[Sam]

It's a madness isn't it.

Check out this interesting idea from marketing genius Seth Godin regarding the NFL lockout...nice one.

Seth's Blog: A game theory of NFL negotiations

[edd]

The owners will get their way as long as Stern is commissioner....

[John]

Originally Posted by Matt

What I'd like to know is how much money the owners are going to lose by not having a season?

I think the point is that they say they're not going to lose any money. They're saying they are losing money at the moment with player salaries/operations expenses going over their revenues. If there's no season presumably the least they're going to do is break-even?

Not all teams are losing money though and it's interesting that one team who is always usually profitable is at the forefront of keeping the lockout lasting longer (Celtics/Wyc Grousebeck).

[Matt]

Surely they'll lose some money, won't they? They won't getting any income from TV or ticket sales but will still have to pay things like arena leasing fees (unless they own the arena themselves outright - not sure how many do), taxes, debt repayments, and staff salaries (for those who haven't been laid off!).

[Matt]

Well, today is lockout D-Day. Stern has said a deal has to get done today or the first two weeks of the season will be cancelled, and the two sides are meeting in New York this afternoon.

What do you think? Will they come out of it with a deal, or not?

I'm about 50-50, or maybe 53-47 (That was a lockout joke for you, btw. Hilarious, I know.) on whether or not they'll get it done today. It makes economic sense for both sides to meet in the middle, but the players have refused to budge over the last few days and I can imagine the owners saying "Screw them, we don't need to compromise further." Hopefully common sense prevails.

[Sam]

Common sense will never prevail haha.

First two weeks of regular season cancelled. The owners have all the power in this one, I think it's only a matter of time before the players realise that.

It's all the people we forget about that suffer the most-the arena/gameday staff, the cleaners etc...the people who's actual livelihood depends on it. Such a shame. I don't think we'll see the NBA until at least 2012.

[Matt]

Yep - it's sad for the fans but even sadder for all those workers. I had a lot of optimism before Monday, but now it's all gone and I agree 2012 is looking like a best-case scenario.

While I sympathise with the players as the owners have clearly not being negotiating in good faith, why couldn't they see that it made sense to compromise and work out a deal on Monday? Now they're going to lose way more money than they would've given up in that compromise.

A couple of good reads here on why both players and owners are being idiots and why the lockout's likely to continue:

'Road' to NBA labor deal hits unnecessary speed bump - NBA - CBSSports.com Basketball
Post-doomsday NBA column: Players beware