This is about to be a moment of reckoning in the player empowerment era if true. Dame is about to start a 4 year extension, 3 years guaranteed. If a player can request out with that much time remaining on his deal, do contracts even matter anymore?
For the record, I think players should be able to do what they want given they drive the revenue and a team can trade them at any moment no matter how dedicated they are to the organization & city. But I can't help but think owners are going to be up in arms if this comes to pass.
I disagree on this take. The whole point of the supermax deal that Dame signed was to allow teams that had developed a franchise player to not lose him in free agency for nothing, and be taken by surprise when that occurred. Dame could have walked as a free agent a year ago, but he didn't, probably because Portland could offer him this special deal that no one else could. Portland will get a chance to restart their franchise with a bevy of picks from a team like the Knicks that otherwise might have signed Dame in free agency. I'm not going to call it a win-win, but the Blazers won't be left high and dry, and that was part of the bargain teams took on when they created the supermax.
At some point, it's going to make it impossible for a team to build anything. And it all generally goes against small market teams. If a small market team gets a star like Lillard or Freak and then they force their way out, what's the point in being a fan of that team? They can't add a 2nd star nearly as easily as one of the big franchises.
If your team isn't competitive because you're nothing but a farm system for bigger franchises, it's eventually going to cripple the fan base for those teams. The NBA will inevitably have to deal with this issue. Letting a handful of stars control personnel is going to cause a lot of franchises to crash and burn, and revenue will crash along with it.
Exactly.
And to Celtics2021's point about teams being able to recoup value, that's highly debatable. It's not like Portland can send him to the team that can make the best offer because his agent will step in if it's not a team of his choice, and that's true for all superstar trade requests. So small market teams aren't even getting to create a proper bidding market.
Then there's the appearance that players are getting their cake and eating it too. Players get these huge designated player contracts that are only supposed to be available from teams that drafted them, then basically having a delayed free agency, because again, they're going to dictate where they're traded.
I think you and C2021 are just saying the same thing, but from a different perspective. In the end, the player gets the big contract and gets to basically play where he wants (to an extent - if a player has 3 years left on his contract, I don't think that will detract an 'unwanted' team from trying to trade for him). But, the team at least gets to recoup some value. For example, if Giannis demanded out next month, the Bucks would be in a lot better position than if he hadn't signed his supermax extension and just went where he wanted in FA.
Back to another C2021 point - I would have been all about going after Dame before we traded Kemba, but we already used that card up. All we have to show for Kemba and a mid-1st is Al Horford, and it's not like Horford is more desirable than Kemba to pretty much any team (other than us evidently). Maybe we can send OKC Horford and a 1st for Kemba and then try a deal for Dame
Topic: Dame Lillard to demand trade shortly per Henry Abbott of True Hoop (Read 18185 times)