Fans to NBA: Just fix it

It took a few months, but now that the NFL lockout is over, fans and players can get back to business. Then there’s the NBA lockout. No serious progress there.

Many believe there will be a long work stoppage, because in the basketball situation, it’s not a case of dividing up the billions. It’s mostly a question of whether many teams can make any money whatsoever.

Still, the NFL agreement shows that the NBA can do likewise, and not even miss many regular season games. The NFL lockout was 4 months. If the NBA followed suit, teams could be playing by mid- or late November and only miss a few games.

The NFL and NBA situations aren’t the same thing, but fans — remember them? — don’t really care. Like balancing the federal budget, people just want the problem fixed.

NBA COMMISSIONER DAVID STERN

While Deron Williams talks of star players going to Europe, that’s a slippery alternative. If foreign basketball were such a viable option, teams would be able to charge $100 a ticket and TV revenues would be astronomical, just as they are in America. There’s not enough revenue in most European economies to make wholesale player defection a realistic option.

Foreign basketball isn’t a better deal for players than the NBA. And NBA agents and players know that. Hence, the players association will eventually fold in the negotiations. It may get a minor concession or two, but plan on the owners winning.

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The NBA situation isn’t that far removed from most peoples’ real life jobs, when you think about it. You believe you’re under appreciated. You’re convinced you deserve higher pay. You think your company is making tons of money but pleading poverty.

But eventually you realize that by leaving, you’re probably not going to make a better situation for yourself.

So you stay where you are.

Maybe not the deal you imagined, but good enough to keep you there.