Been a Celtics fan almost my entire life...now I'm getting tired of the 'game'. I'm not talking about the game on the court, rather the game off the court. In particular I'm frustrated with the revolving door policy the new collective bargaining agreement seems to be perpetuating. Good and mediocre players sticking with one team for any length of time is mostly a thing of the past.
Now more than ever, GM's must manipulate contract salaries against salary cap limits. Players and their agents weigh salary maximization, playing time, teammate desires, endorsement possibilities, taxes, etc. in deciding where they want to play. Somewhere in this mix is a desire to win by both management and players. It seems far down the list though. This setup has always been in place. For some reason it feels a lot different now. Players staying with one team is almost unheard of. (Note the recent CB post..,”Six Celtics returning from last year's team”)
Can one really be a fan under these conditions. Players you cheered for, for 3 years are not resigned because there's not enough room under the cap to sign them. Or, they go elsewhere because they can get more money than their original team can pay.
Over the years many of us wasted countless hours on CB evaluating players, criticizing or praising Danny, Brad, Doc, etc. There seemed to be some purpose... for example, many of us thought or felt we were building a team for the future....we speculated that if we got a few more assets, then we’d be title contenders.
Under the present circumstances, that's a myth. We can't count on players being re-signed. This year alone we lost key players in Bradley and Kelly. We didn't get anything for Kelly and likely a diminished value for Bradley. We griped for years that we should have signed Giannis instead of Kelly. Incredibly, we got NOTHING for him….nada. He was one of team’s best 3 point shooters and found cunning ways of scoring easy baskets near the hoop. Same thing happened last year.... we got NOTHING for Evan Turner….another stalwart on our offence. It’s likely next year another key player will sign elsewhere without us getting compensated. In a few years it could be Tatum or Brown. How can we have hope for the future under these conditions?
Yes, this year we may have acquired new players who might be as good or better than what we let go...But, how does one really cheer for players in the NBA anymore. We know that it's highly probably they'll be heading elsewhere at some point. In general fans build a bond for the better players on their favorite team over time. It doesn't seem this is possible under the current arrangement.
Sometime after the middle of last season a couple CBer's posted that they hadn't been watching the Celtics like they used to. And, they said that they didn't miss it. I’m beginning to wonder if I, and many other NBA fans, might feel the same way this coming season.
Even this summer, I watched two Celtic Summer League games and didn't have much desire to see any more. In the past I would have watched almost every game. Then again, it could just be the Summer League doesn't interest me like it did in the past.
Sadly, I enter the upcoming season with a reluctance to follow NBA basketball. The game seems to be more about money and entertainment, than it is about competition. On the other hand chances are I'll still be a fan because breaking an addiction isn't easy.
Anyone else feel a similar pain or frustration with the current state of contract affairs in the NBA? Or, for other reasons?
(Apologies for the negative tone of this post….maybe some of you can point out a lot of the positives I’m missing.)