Stephen A. Smith | What's the deal? Long contracts are harming the NBA By Stephen A. Smith Inquirer Columnist Continuing its trend of audacious negotiating, the National Basketball Association sat across from its players' association Monday, donning a smirk and considerable leverage, and had the temerity to make it known the league will be looking to pursue a bargaining agreement that would reduce the maximum number of years on player contracts. After another spin of the coaching carousel took place yesterday, with Frank Johnson served up as the latest scapegoat in Phoenix for players whose salaries repeatedly dwarfed their skill, understanding why should be relatively easy. Far too many players play hard only in contract years. They display a few shining moments and are given deals with huge dollars. Then they ride into the sunset, with no championship hardware, leaving fans in their wake like vagrants. And the NBA is tired of it. That includes commissioner David Stern, 29 (soon to be 30) league owners, countless team executives, more players than most would think, and any fan with a reasonable basketball IQ and a conscience. Remember the NBA slogan "I Love This Game"? At the rate things are going, the NBA better come up with something totally different. Quick. Just six weeks into this season and three coaches (Bill Cartwright, Chicago; Doc Rivers, Orlando; and Johnson, Phoenix) are already gone. All three were struggling. None met expectations, and each could point to lusterless stars who were nowhere to be found when needed most. Specifically, when their coaches' jobs were hanging in the balance. "The NBA will never publicly come out and say it, but that's a huge concern of most of the owners," one Western Conference general manager told me weeks before the NBA began openly pursuing its plan to reduce the maximum length of contracts from seven years to five. "They have no problem paying players that produce. But if I'm paying you $103 million, I don't want to hear that your body is breaking down just months after signing this deal. "If you're getting paid $20 million in year five, I want you playing like a $20 million player in year five, not just years one through three. And if attrition is affecting your performance, imagine how it's affecting an owner's wallet." An exception to these problems would be the 76ers. Along with a relentless star in Allen Iverson, they also have a coach, Randy Ayers, who has been magnificent thus far. Without as much as three practices with his full squad this season, without Glenn "Big Dog" Robinson for 18 games, with injuries galore, the Sixers still sit atop the Atlantic Division with a 12-10 record, including two wins over former coach Larry Brown. "Randy's been great, as far as I'm concerned," Billy King, the team's president and general manager, said yesterday. "We're winning with grit and the players, clearly, want to play for him." The league is laden with teams that wish they could say the same. After writing a $45 million check to the league office for a luxury-tax bill, Blazers owner Paul Allen has mandated a huge cut in payroll. That explains why Boston has been pursuing Rasheed Wallace, why the Sixers - when not pursuing Boston's Tony Battie - inquired about sending Robinson and Derrick Coleman to Portland for Wallace, why Minnesota wants him. And why the Blazers aren't listening. With Wallace in the last year of his deal, the Blazers apparently would rather lose the $17 million he represents off their salary cap - and trade Dale Davis instead - than swap salaries by trading him. The same thing happened in Golden State, which was the only reason Antawn Jamison was traded to Dallas for Nick Van Exel. Aside from his notoriety as a huge headache, one of the major reasons Ruben Patterson can't get out of Portland is because no one wants the trade kicker in his contract, which calls from him to get an upfront cash payment of 15 percent of the balance of his contract from the team that trades for him. Meanwhile, nearly everyone with the Blazers is driving Mo Cheeks mad, leaving everyone to wonder how long will it be before he needs to see a psychologist. "Coaching on this level is a great thing," Johnson said yesterday, hours after his firing. "I was honored to be coaching in the NBA and, specifically, for the Phoenix Suns. At the end of the day, they gave me a chance to do what I love and regardless of what anyone says, it comes down to me. We struggled. We didn't meet expectations and, at the end of the day, that responsibility has to fall on my shoulders." Diplomacy. Exhibited by a coach on the day he was axed, knowing that far too many players didn't do what they were supposed to do to win games. Somehow, you doubt that would be the case if every year were a contract year. -------------------------------------- What do you think?
Stephen A. Smith's article was well written, but we have heard all of this before. The problems with the NBA are obvious and a lot of these problems have existed for the last 10 years. I would like to hear his solutions to these problems. You cannot blame the players or the player union for these problems. If the owners are willing to write these checks and negotiate these contracts, and fans are willing to fill up stadiums, then the players should be entitled to whatever they can get. Everyone is in this for the short term, and decisions are based on quick success at a low cost. If a team is not playoff ready within 2 or 3 years we usually see a dismantling of the team and an effort to rebuild. We no longer see dynasties being built in the NBA. The owners don't have the patience or leverage to put together a young team and grow them into a championship team. So until the focus is changed these problems will continue to exist.
Exactly, the NBA and it's respective teams want success fast, they don't have the time nor the patience to wait for it. This shows once again that the NBA has become more of a business than something the players loved to do when they were kids. So the slogan, they can drop it.
