Due to a technical snaffu in tranferring todays 'Toine article, it will not be available. However, Master Po has penned some thoughts on the CBA that are relevant to the Celtics and how they potentially deal with 'Toine. Enjoy.
As you know, the NBA's Collective Bargaining Agreement ends at midnight on June 30th. If owners and the players union can't agree on new terms and thus put a new agreement in place, then the owners will lock the players out - no summer camps (Celtics need a summer camp - so stop the madness), no trades (Celtics need to make some trades - so stop the madness), and no free agent signings (is any free agent coming to Boston?). Doesn't anybody know, or care, that Celtic fans don't have time for this lockout crap? We are 20 years overdue with no time to waste. Stop this stupid stuff! I know it will be resolved at some point, but a lockout, even a small one, does nothing except hurt the game itself and the Celtics progress.
I am sure this rant will step on some toes no matter how I phrase it, so I might as well let it all out. Perhaps Jeff or Hagrid will send me, and my "cheap seat", back to the Shaolin Temple for an early shower. It won't be my first early shower. I don't want to simply say what you can read for yourself about the negotiations, but I had to get this off my chest.
My personal opinions of unions are generally quite low. I live in an area where machinist unions are very prevalent and they are driving jobs out of my area because they seem to not understand the word "compromise". Unions seem to have passed their prime/usefulness years ago, and often seem to protect nobody those who really should not be protected or don't need protecting. Unions seem to often protect the dumb, the lazy, and the undeserving. Please think of poor little Vinnie Baker when I say "the undeserving". Of course, the right to collectively bargain is legal in this country, so the NBA union has the perfect right to extract as much as they can from the NBA owners – at least until they shoot themselves in the foot. How you ask? A lockout with fans who lose interest thus driving down total revenue. The NBA players actually make less over time because they asked for too much - the word to remember is compromise. Does Ron Artest need to lose more money in 2005?
Billy Hunter, the players union Executive Director has already played the racism card so it has turned ugly at the 11th hour. Billy should read Red's book or Bill Russell's book about real racism. Disagreeing with someone does not make them a racist, or mean they the other side is using racist's tactics. Quit playing the damn race card when none exists - that almost makes you a racist Billy.
I am no Collective Bargain Agreement expert by any stretch. I am a neophyte compared to most. It is not reading material I have lying about in my Throne Room. Here is what I understand the five major points of contention to be, along with my Celtic rant on each:
It's time to stop my union-bustin rant. Just get a new agreement Stern and Hunter and quit jacking round in the papers. COMPOMISE for the sake of the game. By the way, can you put into the new agreement that NBA League Pass channel next year has to advertise less and actually show more games with better announcers and that Fox Sports NE has to come up with new commercials each week? Now that would be an agreement worth signing.