Michele Roberts On CBA, Salaries, Revenue
New NBPA head Michele Roberts is stepping into the job just prior to team revenues skyrocketing thanks to the new $24 billion TV deal the league has recently inked. The players can choose to opt out of the current CBA in 2017, and with all the new revenue in play it seems that will be the likely course of action. Roberts spoke with Chris Sheridan of Sheridan Hoops, and the entire piece is worth checking out, but here are some of the highlights…
On the NBA minimum age:
“The word that is troubling to me, generally speaking, is ‘restriction.’ My DNA is offended by the notion that someone should not be able to make a living because he needs to have been alive a year longer. That’s Michele, not Michele NBPA director. I know what it means to be able to make a living and support your family. Emmanuel Mudiay can’t play in his country because he’s not old enough. That makes no sense to me.”
On having a max salary rule:
“I have difficulty with rules that suggest that for some reason, in this space, we are not going to allow you to do what is ordinarily allowed in every other aspect of American life– you can work and get compensated at the level that someone thinks you’re worth being compensated at. And for all the reasons that it might be reasonable, it still–as a base–the premise offends me. So for me, there needs to be a justification that is substantial. And I’m told in large part it’s because there’s an inability on the part of some owners to control their check-writing habits. So that’s where I am. Now, there’s a history that led up to max contracts, and I’m not going to pretend it’s not significant. But if you ask me off the cuff, that’s my response.”
On whether the NBPA intends to opt out of the CBA in 2017:
“We are preparing to opt out. I mean it’s not my call, because unlike Billy [Hunter] I don’t think I run the union. This union is run by the executive committee, I serve at their pleasure, and I do what they command I do. I advise, and I will recommend. But at the end of the day, it’s not Michele Roberts saying to the executive committee: ‘Hello, guys, get ready. We’re opting out.’ It doesn’t work that way. So it’s not my call, but in the event the call is made, we will be ready. And we are preparing to opt out.”
On fair treatment for the players:
“I can tie it up into this whole notion of fairness, but I think at the end of the day they want to be respected for the fact that they are what makes this game successful, and one of the ways to show that is to allow for fair compensation, and any limitations on their ability to make as much money as either the teams or anyone else is prepared to pay them is unfair. You know, we don’t restrict the revenue that owners are able to enjoy. They share it with us, but apart from that there aren’t these overlays that restrict how they can generate new revenue, or what they can do with the revenue. So I think when the players talk about wanting to be treated fairly, they want to be treated as the persons who are responsible for the product. I mean they create the product.”
On the union accepting a lower portion of revenues in the latest CBA:
“I can certainly appreciate why the players are not happy. That’s a lot of money. And it’s hard for me to be critical because I wasn’t in the room, so I cannot say that it was something that was avoidable. But it’s certainly not a happy turn of events, and I get why the players are not of the view that they came out winners.”
And-Ones: Durant, Mullens, Varejao
Thunder star Kevin Durant has a fracture in his right foot, the team announced in a press release. The injury typically requires surgery and Durant is expected to miss a minimum of six to eight weeks before he can resume basketball activities. No procedure has been scheduled as of yet, and the team and Durant’s representatives are still weighing all treatment options. “We are in the process of collaboratively evaluating the most appropriate next steps with Kevin, his representatives, and Thunder medical personnel,” GM Sam Presti said in a statement. “Until a course of action is determined, we are unable to provide a timeline specific to Kevin’s case.” The “Slim Reaper” joins Bradley Beal, Rajon Rondo, and Nick Young, who also sustained injuries that will cause them to miss the beginning of the regular season.
Here’s more from around the league:
- Shanxi Zhongyu of the Chinese Basketball Association is considering waiving former NBA player Byron Mullens, Sports Sohu is reporting (translation by Enea Trapani of Sportando). Mullens appeared in 45 games split between the Sixers and Clippers last season, averaging 4.6 PPG and 2.2 RPG.
- With the new NBA TV deal already creating rumblings from the NBPA, Ira Winderman of The Sun Sentinel believes the best course of action from the league would be to raise the minimum salary level. Winderman’s logic is that since more players than ever are signing for the minimum, obtaining a majority players vote in the next CBA would be much easier, regardless of what other restrictions the league would impose, such as a hard cap or non-guaranteed deals.
- Last season, the Lakers had expressed interest in an Anderson Varejao for Pau Gasol trade with the Cavs, Dave McMenamin of ESPNLosAngeles.com notes (Twitter link). After Varejao’s strong preseason showing in Brazil yesterday against the Heat, where he scored 14 points on 70% shooting, McMenamin opines that you can see why Los Angeles tried to acquire the veteran big man.
- While Coach John Calipari says the Kentucky combine may become an annual event, not everyone is on board with the idea of it, writes Adam Zagoria of SNY.tv. Kansas head coach Bill Self is among the skeptics. “That would certainly not be anything we would do,” Self explains. “That doesn’t mean its wrong. It just means it wouldn’t be for us.”
Chris Crouse contributed to this post.
And-Ones: Jordan, CBA, Hornets, Bulls
Clippers center DeAndre Jordan is entering the final year of his contract this season. Coach Doc Rivers was asked if there was any chance of Jordan inking an extension with the team prior to him hitting free agency, Rivers responded by saying, “He won’t ever accept an extension. Why would he?,” tweets Ben Bolch of the Los Angeles Times. Jordan could only add on three years via an extension, but if he waits to hit free agency he could re-sign with L.A. for five years. The 26 year-old Jordan is set to earn $11,440,123 this season, and will most likely seek a salary in the range of $12MM-$15MM per season on his new deal, though that is just my speculation and not something that Jordan has stated publicly.
Here’s more from around the association:
- In his weekly chat Larry Coon of Basketball Insiders opined that the NBPA would most likely opt out of the current CBA in 2017. Coon believes their reasoning for doing so would be that the players feel that they made concessions when the last CBA was inked back in 2011, but now that the league has become more profitable they will want a bigger slice of revenues. Coon also notes that the new national TV deals will be going into place by then, and the players will want to reap in some of that cash as well.
- Earl Watson and Jason Fraser have joined the Spurs‘ D-League affiliate, the Austin Toros, as assistant coaches, the team announced today.
- The Hornets depth in their backcourt rivals any team’s in the NBA, Scott Lauer of NBA.com opines. In the article, Lauer relays what each player brings to Charlotte and he believes that if the team gets solid production from the forward positions, it could turn out to be a very successful season for the team.
- In his season preview for the Bulls, Adi Joseph of USA Today predicts big things for the franchise. Joseph has the Bulls improving their win total to 57 and snagging the No. 1 seed in the Eastern Conference.
And-Ones: Union, Ariza, Wizards, O’Neal, Nets
Players union executive director Michele Roberts is making $1.2MM this year, the first of a four-year contract, reports Scott Soshnick of Bloomberg.com. Roberts, who officially began the job this week, tells Soshnick that she can earn an additional $600K each year of the pact via bonuses. Either way, it’s significantly less than the $3MM that predecessor Billy Hunter was making per year. Still, Roberts’ salary is on par with what first-year executive directors for the NFL and Major League Baseball players unions have made of late, as Soshnick points out. There’s more on Roberts amid the latest from around the league, as we pass along:
- Roberts didn’t mince words with Stefan Bondy of the New York Daily News in declaring her intention to establish credibility with players and not follow the path of Hunter, whose tenure ended amid allegations of corruption. “I’m sure there are people thinking, ‘Ahh, another politician-like person coming in trying to sell us a bunch of bull,’” Roberts said. “And that’s my job to win them over, to tell them, ‘No, this time it will be different or fire me. I want you to if I even dare replicate my predecessor.’”
- Trevor Ariza was asking for $10MM salaries from the Wizards, but GM Ernie Grunfeld wouldn’t go that high in part because he was pursuing Paul Pierce, writes J. Michael of CSNWashington.com.
- Rasual Butler‘s similarities to Pierce helped him earn a spot on the Wizards preseason roster, but Xavier Silas and Damion James each has a better shot at making it to opening night, as Michael adds in the same piece.
- Warriors GM Bob Myers spoke with veteran center Jermaine O’Neal on Monday, but Myers tells Rusty Simmons of the San Francisco Chronicle that he still doesn’t have much clarity about whether O’Neal will retire or re-sign with Golden State.
- Jerome Jordan‘s deal with the Nets becomes partially guaranteed for $100K should he remain on the roster through October 25th, not $150K as previously reported, a source tells Robert Windrem of Nets Daily (Twitter link).
- Spurs assistant coach Sean Marks is moving off the bench and returning to the front office in a new role as assistant GM, the team announced. Marks spent two years as an executive before San Antonio made him an assistant coach last season.
Cray Allred contributed to this post.
And-Ones: Parker, Heat, Roberts. Allen
Jabari Parker knows the history of second-overall pick busts in the NBA, and is determined not to be the next, writes Brett Pollakoff of NBC Sports.com. The Bucks rookie said, “There’s been a lot of second pick busts. I’m just trying not to be that bust. Everyday that I step on the court, I just remind myself that I have a long ways to go. If I want to be one of those guys in the first tier of the NBA, like a LeBron [James], like a Kobe [Bryant] , like a [Blake Griffin], then I have to have that mentality starting off from the ground, and work my way up.”
Here’s more from around the league:
- The Cavs are optimistic about their chances to sign Ray Allen prior to the start of training camp, tweets Marc J. Spears of Yahoo! Sports.
- With the NBA reportedly considering a change in the lottery system, Brian Schmitz of the Orlando Sentinel explains why such a move would be an overreaction from Adam Silver and company.
- The Heat’s win total this season could be affected if any changes are made to the NBA Draft lottery system, writes Ira Winderman of the Sun Sentinel. If there is less of a reason for franchises to tank, then Miami couldn’t necessarily count on padding their record against the Sixers, Magic, and Bucks, opines Winderman.
- The selection of Michele Roberts as NBPA head was a historic one, with Roberts becoming the first female to lead a professional sports union. In an interview with Andrew Keh of The New York Times, Roberts said she was all too aware that if she was selected, she would represent several hundred male athletes in the NBA; she would deal with league officials and agents who were nearly all men; and she would negotiate with team owners who were almost all men. To this, Roberts said, “My past is littered with the bones of men who were foolish enough to think I was someone they could sleep on.”
- Kentucky freshman Karl-Anthony Towns will be a strong possibility to be the No. 1 overall pick in next year’s NBA Draft, writes Adam Zagoria of SNY.tv. DraftExpress currently has Towns ranked fourth behind Jahlil Okafor, Cliff Alexander and Emmanuel Mudiay.
Cray Allred contributed to this post.
And-Ones: NBPA, Allen, Sixers
History was made last week with the hiring of Michele Roberts as head of the NBPA, writes Gary Washburn of the Boston Globe. Roberts is the first woman to be named the head of a professional sports union, and she will strive to rectify the apathy and disinterest that plagued the union during the final years of former chief Billy Hunter‘s reign, writes Washburn.
Here’s more from around the league:
- The Sixers would rather be good than be liked, writes Bob Ford of The Philadelphia Inquirer. Philadelphia’s alleged tanking in order to rebuild their roster through the draft hasn’t garnered them many fans around the league, notes Ford. Their strategy has also prompted discussions to revise the draft lottery process, as well as angered teams who received less via revenue sharing thanks to the attendance dropoff the losing has caused.
- Free agent Ray Allen would be content with retiring this summer, writes Don Amore of the Hartford Courant. Allen said, “My family is very important in making the decision. Right now, there is nothing that I need to do. If I ultimately decide this will be it for me, I’m content with that.” Allen isn’t hurrying his decision, saying, “I’m not in any rush. I’ve played 18 years, and the way I look at my career, I’m content with everything that I’ve done. I just want to take this summer and see how it goes.”
- Selecting players in the NBA Draft is always a gamble. Every year there are players who are steals, and selections that don’t pan out. Jay Yeomans of the Deseret News looks back at the 2010 draft, and where each player should have been taken given their performance in the league thus far.
Eastern Notes: Irving, Lottery, Moore, Bayless
Kyrie Irving is still upset with rumors that he wanted out of Cleveland that persisted until he signed a five-year extension nearly a month ago, and he has no issue with ceding his position as the preeminent star of the Cavs to LeBron James, as Bleacher Report’s Kevin Ding details. Of course, Irving might wind up as the third most important player on the team should Cleveland swing a deal for Kevin Love. There was news on that front earlier, and we’ll pass along a few more items from around the Eastern Conference here:
- The league’s proposal for evening out the odds in the draft lottery isn’t generating a ton of enthusiasm from the Sixers or anyone else, Grantland’s Zach Lowe writes. Critics most commonly suggest that it wouldn’t effectively deter tanking for the top pick and that it would encourage tanking among teams with a chance to make the playoffs, according to Lowe. Many agree with the Sixers that immediate implementation of the proposal for next year’s draft would be an issue.
- The league projects the Sixers to have turned a net profit of about $10.4MM from last season, Lowe also reveals in his piece. Still, the Sixers didn’t make any contributions to revenue sharing last season, Lowe writes, a matter that had reportedly been a bone of contention for other clubs.
- Former Magic guard E’Twaun Moore is drawing interest from Olimpia Milano of Italy, Sportando’s Enea Trapani reports. Orlando withdrew its qualifying offer to Moore last month, making him an unrestricted free agent.
- The contract that Jerryd Bayless signed today with the Bucks is for two years and a total of $6MM, a source tells Charles F. Gardner of the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel.
- Hawks swingman Kyle Korver has been re-elected to a three-year term as vice president of players union, Lowe reports (Twitter link).
Eddie Scarito contributed to this post.
And-Ones: Union, Douglas, Nets, Moreland
The contracts for six NBA players will become fully guaranteed if their teams don’t waive them by the end of Friday, and two more players will earn partial guarantees if they avoid getting cut. Draymond Green and Khris Middleton almost certainly won’t be cast aside between now and that deadline, but for the rest, the summer temperatures won’t be the only reason to sweat out the next few days. Here’s more from the NBA:
- Players association VP Roger Mason Jr. insists that union leadership addressed concerns from membership regarding the hiring process for a new executive director and the departure of search committee leader Kevin Johnson, as Mason tells Bleacher Report’s Jared Zwerling. Discord had marked the union’s Monday meeting in which Michele Roberts handily won a vote to fill the executive director vacancy.
- The Bulls had been targeting free agent Toney Douglas, but they’ve abandoned their pursuit after signing Aaron Brooks, according to K.C. Johnson of the Chicago Tribune.
- Former NBA head coach Paul Westphal highlights the assistant coaching hires that the Nets officially announced today. Brooklyn also brought on Joe Wolf, Jay Humphries and Mavs assistant Tony Brown. John Welch and Jim Sann are the only holdovers from last season.
- The Warriors and Knicks were interested in undrafted forward/center Eric Moreland, according to Shams Charania of RealGM. Charania reported Tuesday that Moreland had agreed to join the Kings instead.
- The Hawks invited summer league guard Stephen Holt to fall training camp, but he instead signed a deal with a German team, reports Chris Vivlamore of the Atlanta Journal-Constitution.
Union Elects Michele Roberts
Trial lawyer Michele Roberts became the first woman to lead a major North American pro sports union early Tuesday morning when the National Basketball Players Associated elected her as its new executive director. TNT’s David Aldridge was the first to report the news (Twitter link). Roberts captured 32 of a possible 36 votes among player representatives from each of the league’s 30 teams and the union’s executive committee, easily surpassing the required two-thirds majority in spite of reports detailing dissension before the vote.
“Let’s be clear: I’m sure there were people that noticed I was a girl,” Roberts said to reporters, including Ken Berger of CBSSports.com, following the vote. “Having said that, I frankly wanted to address that question up front whenever I spoke with any of the members of the executive committee and the union. My sense was, the only thing people cared about was my resolve.”
Roberts, a member of the Washington, D.C.-based firm Skadden, Arps, Slate, Meagher & Flom, has won plaudits as a “talented and ruthless” litigator, Berger writes. She beat out Mavs CEO Terdema Ussery and tech industry CEO Dean Garfield, the other two finalists for the job that’s remained vacant since the union ousted longtime executive director Billy Hunter at the All-Star Game in 2013.
“It shows how open-minded our players are,” union president Chris Paul said, as Berger notes. “With any of the candidates, it wasn’t about race or gender. It was about who was going to be the best person in that position. From day one in interviews, she tackled every question head first. … There were tough questions she was faced with. She didn’t back away from them. She didn’t shy away from them. She told us her story, and it really sat well with us.”
Roberts first emerged as one of two finalists for the post in February, but the union decided soon after to renew its search. Sacramento mayor Kevin Johnson teamed with the NBPA to form a search committee that interviewed more than 70 candidates, but Johnson left the process amid disagreement with the union’s executive committee in the days leading up to the vote. Johnson’s departure seemed to reopen the door to the skepticism and discord that had marked much of the union’s slow movement toward a hire. Agents and players alike called for yet another delay in the process. A player told Adrian Wojnarowski of Yahoo! Sports (Twitter link) that he wanted more time to consider the finalists after they each made presentations Monday night to the attendees, who were roughly 120 in number, as Berger writes. That’s in contrast to the 35 who were in attendance when Hunter was deposed, Berger also points out.
Former union executive committee member Jerry Stackhouse was particularly critical. He believed current executive committee members, who identified Roberts as a candidate before Johnson’s involvement, were attempting to “save face” by supporting her candidacy, according to USA Today’s Sam Amick (Twitter links). Stackhouse attended the meeting, but was eventually forced to leave because he’s no longer an NBA player, Amick notes (Twitter link).
Paul and the executive committee were indeed the prime movers behind the choice of Roberts, sources told Wojnarowski (Twitter link). Ultimately, Roberts’ track record as a litigator, unblemished character, and her vision for change won over the rest of the union’s voting members, as Wojnarowski, in a full story, and Berger report. The close ties between league management and Ussery, whom former commissioner David Stern considers a friend, scuttled his chances, Jared Dudley told Ramona Shelburne of ESPNLosAngeles.com (Twitter link).
Latest On NBPA Executive Director Vote
The three finalists for the vacant NBPA Executive Director position are Mavericks CEO Terdema Ussery, Michele Roberts, a trial attorney, and Dean Garfield, the CEO and president of the Information Technology Industry Council. The players are scheduled to vote at 10pm (CDT) this evening in Las Vegas.
Here’s the latest on the upcoming vote:
- Former NBA player Jerry Stackhouse attended the NBPA meeting regarding the Executive Director vote and criticized the process, reports Adrian Wojnarowski of Yahoo! Sports (Twitter links). One player told Wojnarowski that Stackhouse was trying to “initiate a divide.”
- The NBPA executive committee believes it will get a vote on a new executive director tonight despite talk of potentially delaying the vote, tweets Wojnarowski.
- Another player told Wojnarowski (Twitter link) that, “This is a cluster. They’re trying to slam a director down our throats.“
Earlier Updates:
- The Kevin Johnson-led search committee interviewed more than 70 candidates for the union’s executive director vacancy, USA Today’s Jeff Zillgitt reports. The union is set to vote this evening on the three finalists, though Johnson won’t be present after an apparent falling out with the executive committee. Union secretary-treasurer James Jones told Zillgitt that the players would have preferred that he stayed on until the hire was complete, but added that there was little for Johnson and his committee to do once the finalists were identified.
- There have been some rumblings from those present for the vote asking if the vote is happening too quickly given the relative anonymity of the three finalists, reports Marc Stein of ESPN.com (Twitter link).
- According to the schedule presented by the union, players will get 45-minute sessions to get to know each of the three candidates and then cast their votes, tweets Stein.
- Stein also tweets that numerous agents, after a conference call earlier today, have advised players to seek a delayed vote to ensure the finalists are indeed the best finalists for the job.
Chuck Myron contributed to this post.