The public jockeying between the owners and players union in major league baseball has been at the forefront of headlines in recent days as stars like Blake Snell balk at the prospect of an additional paycut on top of what’s been agreed upon months ago. Other big names have supported his comments as the league tries to inch closer towards a return.
That type of dissension has not been present so far in the NBA ranks, at least in a public forum. The president of the players union’ Chris Paul spoke on ESPN’s The Jump Friday striking a balanced tone of the challenges that lie ahead and a desire to get back on the court, presenting a united front between his camp and the owners.
"A lot of hard conversations that have to be made, a lot of hard decisions," Paul said. "But with the team around us, I think ultimately we'll get to where we want to. Obviously we want to play. Oh man, we want to play. We want to play bad. And I think that's a consensus for the guys around the league. We want it to be, obviously, as safe as possible. But the biggest thing is, we miss the game."
The NBA’s revenue-sharing system (a 50/50 split between players and owners based on a complicated formula) already being in place should help keep the turmoil minimized compared to what we are seeing from the MLB players union. That along with the fact that salary reductions from the NBA will be far less than the MLB for 2019 due to the fact that 80 percent of the regular season already being completed will make finding common ground for NBA owners and the union an easier task for 2020 when negotiations about resuming play get serious in the coming weeks.
The tougher financial questions facing both sides will come for the 2020-21 regular season. The league was projected to earn roughly $8 billion for the current season to be split among the players and owners. Some league sources told BSJ that they expect that number to go down to closer to $6 billion based on the loss of arena sales among other factors. That’s assuming the NBA even gets clearance to finish out the 2019-20 season in the first place.