Lockout may not be looming

Amidst all the festivities of All-Star Weekend, some encouraging news regarding the future of the league:

Stern optimistic NBA will avoid a lockout

Seems as though the possibility remains, but it seems far less likely than it did when rumours of another labour strike surfaced earlier this season. I, for one, do not want to see a repeat of the 1998/1999 fiasco, nor anything similar to what has happened with the National Hockey League.

they better play smart and take this opportunity to steal some hockey fans and not loss fans like the NHL has.

Last edited by Amphatoast on Tue Feb 22, 2005 4:49 am, edited 1 time in total.

hockey fans

and what are these?

the amount of these 'hockey fans' converting to NBA i believe will end up to be a negative number

David Stern knows that a lockout is bad for the NBA... good luck to him for preventing one!

the amount of these 'hockey fans' converting to NBA i believe will end up to be a negative number

Well the amount of hockey fans in the US was already almost nothing, and expansion outside of Canada is what has killed the game. American business owners throw their money at a Canadian franchise and move it to One Tooth County, Arkansas and assume it will do as well there as it did in Canada.

There were never that many basketball fans in Canada to begin with, because most have never experienced it at the NBA level. The majority of fans in Vancouver saw an expansion team play brand new lineups of cheap free agents and guys off everyone elses IR. They could never draft and no one wanted to play there, despite it being one of the most beautiful cities in the world.

I feel like going on a Canada vs. U.S. rant here, so be prepared mods to delete this at your discretion.

hockey fans

and what are these?

They are those guys who inhabit that huge land mass above you guys, the ones who don't have murder rates higher than grade point averages. We're the ones not lead by a government that so badly divides the country into the super rich and the super poor. We're the ones who didn't elect a retarded sock puppet with a face to lead our country, not only once, but twice. Oh wait, sorry, once.

Despite all of this, Canadians still repect Americans. You've always supported our countries decisions (well, except for getting involved with WWII, but once someone attacked you, you were right behind us) and even though we burnt down your White House, we still remained good friends. We are partners, our average citizens lead very similar lifestyles, and have the same relative ideals in life. We accept being "your little buddy" because we know we can always depend on you, and you with us.

In conclusion, we support your major sports like baseball, basketball, NASCAR, wraslin', bass fishing and football (we're still trying to get an NFL team), so in return, can't you support just one of ours?

On a side note

America owns all.

As for the lockout, I don't think anything will happen. This big issue is max contracts and stuff. The players want the max contracts to be really high and really long but the owners only want the max contract to be like 4 years 85 mill.

Those are the kinds of issues that led to the last lockout. The players association and the owners have to come to an agreement for a new CBA to be signed and for business to go on as usual. If they can't come to an agreement regarding the issues facing them, then we have a problem.

Hopefully Mr. Stern can get an age limit for the draft in this year's CBA?

Hopeful thinking I guess.

oh well theirs always Football and Cricket to watch if anything happens to the League next year. But I highly doubt it will, D-Stern wont let it happen again so soon and it'll all be fixed in a matter of time. I think the players too dont want to go through what the hockey players went through.

And as for Kevin's post, O' Canada (y) God Bless America (n)

The hockey lockout has scared the crap out of the NBA. They won't let their league go the way of hockey.

Hopefully that's the case - that the decline in ratings and fan support after the last NBA lockout and the situation with the NHL will encourage both sides to avoid another long labour strike. A couple of weeks to sort out details is fine. There was a brief lockout before the 1995/1996 season, but it was resolved much quicker and without the fuss there was in 1998/99.