The NBA Lockout, Explained By Gilbert Arenas (Insightful & simple)

[Change]

Courtesy of SBnation

For the people who don't know why the'yre lockin out... I'll explain it in real people terms. Lakers, Dallas, Miami, Knicks, Magic, Bulls, Boston, and a few others always have the best chance at the top free agents due to city and money. So the smaller cities team can't compete. So they can never get better and they're always losing money. So since they cant control each other spending money on players, they want us to do it for them by signing a new deal. It's that simple.

All the older owners have made their money and selling to new buyers, and the new buyers are getting killed in these small cities. But no matter what deal gets done, free agents are gonna go to the same cities ANYWAY. That's why the same teams stay good and the same teams stay bad. The owners with the most money will try to buy the best players.

So like the Lakers just signed a 175 million dollar TV deal. But they don't want to share that with the rest, they want US to do it. I know people are like, "You make 20 [million] and are not worth it..." TRUE. But the man who paid me thought I was too him. You're worth what someone gives you.

I haven't been to one meeting but I know when unrealistic people are trying to make a statement they're gonna do it. It's like me saying I wanna play 52 minutes-a-game every night. "Well there's only 48." WELL find me four more minutes then. If not, LOCKOUT. ****oooooo.

So when you hear your team say we're REBUILDING all they're saying is buy our tickets, watch us lose. The Clippers have been rebuilding for 20+ years and made one playoff series. You can be like Oklahoma City and have young talent but eventually you're gonna have to pay all those players and you can't. And then what happens? Umm the famous REBUILDING.

Lol it's a rat race they're tryin to get out of, and they need us to do it for them. SMH.

I see people saying teams like Spurs and Detroit did it. Well, the Spurs had a great team that got hit buy the injury bug and got the number 1 pick and got Duncan. So from there they just built around him. The Pistons got lucky. All the free agents they got was very cheap but good players. And that's why they broke up. They were worth more then they were before.

So I don't see it ending sooner. Trust me, they're gonna sit back and let us kill ourselves like last time. So I'm gonna tell y'all the truth, but no disrespecting anybody. There's no need for all that. If you're boss wants to pay you less he has a right to try and do so. [But] even if they have pay cuts then what? Are they gonna give out free food with all the extra money they're gettng? Ummmm no. They're gonna get a new 20 million dollar scoreboards and still scream we're losing money...

[GreenEnvy]

The Lakers, Mavs, Heat, Knicks, Magic, Bulls, and Celtics are always good and attract all the top free agents?

What free agents has Boston ever brought in, especially during the roughly 15 years of losing between the Big Three's?

The Bulls were a great franchise exactly once, and it had a little to do with a guy named Jordan.

The Magic I don't recall bringing in any good free agent, and have never won a championship.

The Knicks have been an embarrassment to New York and the NBA for the last decade.

The Mavs won this year after years of failure. Cuban overpays for everyone.

The Heat were decent (and ringless) in the 90's. Wade fell to them and they got a superstar in Shaq who demanded a trade. Then "the decision" happened. Before that, no free agents really cared about the tax break or the hot weather.

I'll give the Fakers credit, they always seem to stay respectable one way or another.

Great players usually get drafted by the bad teams, which are generally from smaller markets. They simply need to do a better job of keeping them happy. It has less to do with location (I'm sure 'Melo loved the city of Denver and DWill loved Salt Lake City) and more to do with the lack of confidence in management to get the right mix of help.

[PosImpos]

He's overselling the point, but Gilbert's point is a solid one.

The lockout isn't just about players vs. owners, it's also about small market teams vs. big market teams.

[KCattheStripe]

Gilbert literally just made all the right points using all the wrong examples.

[paulcowens]

Beautifully put, by Arenas.  The Owners don't want to share such things as tv wealth, so they are trying to force the players to do it out of their end.

[soap07]

Gilbert literally just made all the right points using all the wrong examples.

You nailed it.

The "rebuilding" stuff was particularly interesting, although some teams, like the C's, rebuilt and actually did it without signing major free agents.

[cman88]

The Lakers, Mavs, Heat, Knicks, Magic, Bulls, and Celtics are always good and attract all the top free agents?

What free agents has Boston ever brought in, especially during the roughly 15 years of losing between the Big Three's?

The Bulls were a great franchise exactly once, and it had a little to do with a guy named Jordan.

The Magic I don't recall bringing in any good free agent, and have never won a championship.

The Knicks have been an embarrassment to New York and the NBA for the last decade.

I would say that the years of mediocrity for the celtics and Knicks were more due to poor management than anything...look how fast the knicks turned around under Donnie Walsh, or the celtics under danny ainge?...Even now, we hear players like Josh smith would like to play for the celts...

they can be attractive cities to play in, but poor mis-management and lack of cap space never allowed them to thrive

[Rondo_is_better]

[ManUp]

That's wrong... 

...yes I laughed. 

[action781]

insightful and simple?

scatterbrained and befuddling


That second paragraph in quote 2?  I'm not sure what the point is.  I really don't know what point Agent Zero is trying to get across there.  Is it about TV or his salary?  (I did like his humbleness there though)

"Well, find me four more minutes then.  If not, lockout."  Um, WHAT? 

[clover]

The NBA wants its big market teams to be better.  Sure, they want the small market teams to have hope, but pure parity is not in the interest of the league.

[snively]

There's the Arenas I used to enjoy. 

[greenpride32]

What's ironic about this whole piece is Arenas is the perfect example of why the owners need change.  He has a $110m contract and for the duration of that deal his fair market worth will be no more than $30m.  So you can basically chalk this up as an $80m loss for the owners. To make matters worse the owners hands are tied and they can't do anything about it (cap and guaranteed salary).

Have you noticed in all the player interviews not a single one of them has a complaint?  Of course not, they're walking away with all the money, regardless of how the team is doing financially and regardless of how they perform on the court, or if they are even on the court at all for that matter. 

As the system currently stands, it's 100% risk for the owners, yet the players think they deserve over 50% of the reward.  Or in other words it's very one sided.

[Rondo_is_better]

Owners are getting screwed but they screwed themselves. They basically pushed the players into the high ground and held them there by force. Now the owners are trying to pull them down and the players are kicking and screaming.

[csfansince60s]

The lockout isn't just about players vs. owners, it's also about small market teams vs. big market teams.

This is a very good point which underscores the layers and levels of complexity, the plots and the subplots and the consequent convoluted and intertwined dynamics that are in play here, which quite frankly make it really difficult for me to wrap my mind around this whole thing.

That is why Zero's take on this is so seductive. As the OP (TP) put it, it is insightful and simple, yet woefully incomplete.

Big vs small market teams. Tremendously deep-pocketed owners vs not so deep/or not willing to take a loss owners.

 Superstars who have made their $$ vs those budding superstars who haven't vs middle class players who have made $$$ vs those who are on the cusp vs MLE players vs LLE players vs vet min players vs 1st round guaranteed contract rookies vs those selected in the second round who aren't guaranteed anything whose future can be greatly impacted positively or negatively due to the lockout.

All with different interests and different agendas.

AY YI YI!!!! My head hurts.