This past week's trainwreck sent me to the wayback machine to see what happened in 1998-99, the last time the NBA had a shortened season. On Oct 13, 1998, the NBA canceled the first 2 weeks of the regular season. I believe that this year it was Oct 10. After this, the NBA didn't make any further announcements regarding canceled games until Dec 8, 1998 when they announced the cancellation of the 1999 All Star Game. On Dec 23, 1998, Stern set a deadline of Jan 7, 1999 for the cancellation of the season. On Dec 30, 1998, the owners sent the NBPA an offer and requested that the players vote on it. The union rejects this idea and instead sends its final proposal to the owners on Jan 4, 1999. The owners rejected the players final proposal. On Jan 6, 1999, the day before Stern's drop-dead date, Stern and Hunter held a secret all-night meeting from which a settlement was reached. Though the new CBA wasn't signed until Jan 20, 1999, free agent signings were allowed beginning on Jan 18, 1999. Teams played 2 preseason games beginning on Jan 24, 1999 and the 50-game regular season began on Feb 5, 1999. While there's no guarantee that history will repeat itself this time around, I thought some of you would want to know the relative importance of certain dates on the upcoming calendar.
