We are getting closer to the one year anniversary of the 2011 NBA lockout and it seems that just about nothing was solved. The lockout, which was initiated by the owners of the National Basketball Association, had two main complaints; one the players were being paid too much (reasonable) and the second complaint came from small owners who were sick of watching their players leave to go to bigger markets. Thus, they wanted to add a clause that gave them a huge advantage in keeping their stars.
The first complaint was very understandable; NBA players are overpaid. Johan Petro, former Nets center, now Hawks center, gets a 4M a year salary for producing litte. Similarly Rashard Lewis has a salary of 24 million a year. Owners have no problem overpaying for superstars, because in the end fans come to the arenas and buy jerseys for the super stars, but the problem lied more in the overpaid mediocre players.
The second complaint however, became the main focus for many owners during the lockout, and it also led to a division amongst the owners. Owners including Dan Gilbert in Cleveland and GM David Kahn in Minnesota and many others ended up in disagreements with owners such as James Dolan in New York and Mickey Arison in Miami. Dolan and Arison don't want the smaller teams to have an advantage to keep their stars because they're in big markets where players will flock to, (James, Wade, Bosh-MIA, Melo, Stat, Chandler-NYK). In the end David Stern persuaded the big market owners to agree to rules that gave home teams a huge advantage over other teams. Super stars that enter free agency can get an extra year (5 year instead of 4) with their home team as well as more money per year. Stern needs owners to be content with being owners, or else they will sell and you'll have situations similar to New Orleans, where no one wanted to buy them for a long period of time. Future owners need to have incentives to be owners. These men are businessmen and understand that without superstars your team's chances of winning and selling out decrease dramatically.
Currently the "home team" can offer more money, but the question remains has that changed the culture of the league? The answer is no. Super stars still want to play with other super stars. The problem is with this dynamic is having multiple superstars is very expensive. The owners that are able to sign multiple super stars, will have to pay a luxury tax, and those owners are in big market cities. Sure you have teams like the Spurs and Thunder, but those teams are anomalies, they're incredibly rare. NBA players are the most demanding athletes because not only do they want to make money and win, but they want those two components in big flashy cities. They want to play in New York, Boston, Chicago Miami, Los Angeles, and Dallas. Who was on Deron Williams wish list, the Nets, now in Brooklyn, the Mavericks, and he said he would welcome a trade to the Lakers. Who does Dwight Howard want to play for, the Nets, the Lakers and the Mavericks. Chris Paul is happy in Los Angeles, but he also loves the Knicks.
My point is that the league can do whatever it wants to try to make stars stay with their small teams like the Jazz, the Bucks, or the Bobcats, but they're not staying. Unless you're a small market team and you are able to draft perfectly like the Spurs and the Thunder, your stars will leave. Ginobili, Duncan, and Parker, are different from the rest of the stars, don't get me wrong, but they weren't going to go to a better situation. They had a dynasty right in front of them, especially with a coach like Popovich. You're seeing the same thing with the Thunder. Durant and Westbrook could have become free agents, but they had a perfect situation right before their eyes. Stars like Carmelo, CP3, Lebron, and Dwight, are allowed to explore their options and they should, because the bigger market teams are the teams that give you the best chance to win. They don't guarantee victory, but they give you basically everything you could want.Those guys also weren't drafted into perfect situations, they had general managers who made huge blunders, thus they were obviously going to look around at other spots.
We are already seeing new stars becoming frustrated with their home teams a la Kevin Love. The double double machine called out his teammates and upper management when he said if this team doesn't improve he's out. What's so scary is that Kevin Love is one of the only super stars that is not locked up in a very long term deal. Deron and Joe Johnson in Brooklyn, Melo, Chandler, and Stat are in New York, Lebron, Wade, and Bosh are in Miami, Paul, Griffin, Kobe Bynum, and Pau in LA, Nowitzki in DAL, Rose in CHI, Pierce and Rondo in BOS and Durant and Westbrook in OKC. The only star I didn't mention is Dwight Howard and he will be on one of those teams I just mentioned within the year (I probably also forgot a few on the way).
Lebron said a few years ago that the league should consolidate, and I disagree with that, because I love how the NBA is everywhere across the US, but it's basically consolidating by itself. There are no stars in Detroit, Toronto, Goldenstate, Sacramento, Utah, Phoenix, Charlotte, Denver, and the rest I didn't mention have great young talent who are going to have to decide in a few years, do I stay in a small city or do I go big. Let's see what Kyrie Irving, Brandon Jennings and even Anthony Davis do. By the way I totally recognize that Indiana has Roy Hibbert and Paul George who are very solidr and Portland has Lamarcus Aldridge who is fantastic, but I am generalizing.
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