I approach this post with trepidation, because it’s going to be an extremely positive account of what happened last night after 15 hours of labor negotiations. And we all know that positive accounts of NBA labor talks have always been followed with a “WHOA! Not so fast there buddy” negative story that makes our heads spin.
But I’m going in. Here goes.
Somewhere around 3 AM this morning, David Stern, Adam Silver, Billy Hunter and Derek Fisher walked out of some posh Manhattan hotel conference room. They met with a throng of media that may or may not have spent the past 15 hours looking for jobs that don’t require standing somewhere for more than half a day doing nothing. And when they spoke, they sang songs of hope, lifting everyone’s spirits with the dulcet tones of perfectly harmonized voices.
Or rather, they said they’d made a lot of progress. But at 3 AM after standing there for 15 hours, the words “a lot of progress” probably did sound a lot like that singing stuff.
Here’s a sampling. From Yahoo:
Negotiators met for more than 15 hours, finishing past 3 a.m. ET Thursday, and sources said talks centering on the system issues resulted in significant progress on one of the labor fight’s most vexing obstacles: the luxury tax teams would have to pay for going over the salary. Negotiations will resume at 2 p.m. ET Thursday.
“They need [Thursday] to punch it over end line,” one source briefed on the talks told Y! Sports.
It’s beginning to look like time for push to come to shove and for the lockout, well into its fourth month, to have its best chance of coming to an end.
“This has been a very arduous and difficult day, and productive,” commissioner David Stern said after 4 a.m. in a conference room of a Manhattan luxury hotel. “(Thursday) is going to be just as arduous and difficult, if not more so. We hope that it can be as productive.”
The two sides are reconvening at 2 p.m., with National Basketball Players Association executive director Billy Hunter saying an 82-game season remains “possible” if a deal were reached by Sunday or Monday.
The sides also are struggling over items such as the length of the deal, players’ contract lengths and the size of their raises.
“There’s no deal on anything unless there’s a deal on everything,” Stern said.
Meanwhile, sources told ESPN The Magazine’s Chris Broussard that All-Stars LeBron James,Carmelo Anthony and Chris Paul withdrew from a scheduled global exhibition tour Wednesday in part because the trio is somewhat optimistic about the season beginning shortly.
Hell, the mood was so light, David Stern even got a chance to zing both sides.
Twitter / @alanhahn: Best line: Stern, on last … via kwout
It’s funny, because Stern’s comments provide the biggest points of contention. But I digress.
Both sides spent 15 hours yesterday hammering out a number of issues. The key thing, though, is that they never touched the split of the BRI, instead choosing to table it until they got other stuff done. Because that’s the biggest problem with these talks, I just can’t say I expect the lockout to end tonight. But if cooler heads are prevailing, and the players give just a little more on some systemic issues, owners may just well move off their 50/50 split.
Will a deal get done tonight? I’m guessing not. But we’re a hell of a lot closer than we were yesterday at this time. And for the first time in all of this I can finally say….
It’s looking like a season. How U.
