NBA Season Review: Time for Change.... Seriously.

Hey, you know what's popular right now? The National Basketball Association. After antagonizing basketball fans for five solid months (the lockout), barely avoiding a potential catastrophe (a nearly canceled season) and suffering a public relations semicatastrophe (the voided Chris Paul trade), the NBA weathered the storm, regrouped and delivered a uniquely entertaining first month. That's right, there's hope for you yet, Lana Del Rey.

The ratings support what we think we're seeing: ESPN's first 14 games averaged a 1.7 rating, rising a whopping 31 percent from last season's Christmas-to-now stretch. TNT's Christmas season opener (Knicks-Celtics) notched a 5.9, becoming the fourth-most-watched regular-season NBA game ever on cable. Meanwhile, TNT's NBA ratings are up 70 percent (with help from that Christmas game, but still), NBA TV's ratings are up 68 percent and an estimated 6.7 million people have uttered the words, "I can't understand Shaq."

Here's the weird part: The product itself hasn't been good. Blame the owners for this one: Instead of playing 60 games over 120 days (fairly reasonable), they crammed 66 games into those 120 days (unreasonable). Why do it that way? Hold on, I'll give you a second to think about it.

(Twiddling my thumbs.)

(Humming time.)

And … time!

The answer: Ummmm....DUH Money!!!

You were expecting another reason? Players were paid for six extra games, owners received three extra home games apiece, and fans were treated to a slew of, "We know you paid to see Derrick Rose tonight, but playing in his place, here's John Lucas III!!!!" moments because nicked-up players have no time to heal. Screw the fans, right? We're just in the way. Throw in a missing training camp (deadly for teams with new coaches or too many new players) and the lack of practice time and … I mean, how did these first five weeks have a chance?

Which teams struggled the most? Let's see … painfully untalented teams (Charlotte, Washington), rosters that experienced too much turnover (Sacramento, New Orleans), teams handpicked by Joe Dumars or Bryan Colangelo (Detroit, Toronto), teams brazenly gutting their roster for a 12.65 percent chance at Dwight Howard (New Jersey), and teams that sabotaged their rosters while refusing to do the dignified thing and trade their signature player even though he's a good guy and would rather sink with the Sarvertanic over selling out his teammates by asking out (Phoenix) all morphed into something between "an unequivocal mess" and a "first-class shitshow." Older contenders (Dallas, San Antonio, Boston) and top-heavy rosters (New York, the Lakers) struggled to get going, while young legs (Philly, Denver, Oklahoma City), roster depth (Indiana, Minnesota, Chicago) and even altitude (Utah, Denver again) mattered a little too much. I haven't decided whether this year's title winner will come with a permanent asterisk — like the 1999 Spurs, for example — but we could be headed that way.

"Hold on a second," you're saying. "This doesn't make sense. You're crapping on the same season that everyone seems to be enjoying … including you! Explain yourself."

The easy answer: We haven't had this much top-shelf talent and this many storylines in nearly 20 years (since the iconic 1992-93 season). Here, check this out …

1993: Michael Jordan, Charles Barkley, Hakeem Olajuwon, David Robinson, Karl Malone, Patrick Ewing (superstars); Scottie Pippen, John Stockton, Mark Price, Larry Johnson, Shaquille O'Neal (franchise guys); Tim Hardaway, Kevin Johnson, Drazen Petrovic, Chris Mullin, Dominique Wilkins (entertaining All-Stars); Joe Dumars, Dan Majerle, Reggie Lewis, Reggie Miller, Mitch Richmond, Danny Manning, Larry Nance, Derrick Coleman, Dennis Rodman, Brad Daugherty (All-Stars); Isiah Thomas, Clyde Drexler, James Worthy (tenured All-Stars); Kenny Anderson, Shawn Kemp (entertainment X-factors); Gary Payton, Latrell Sprewell, Christian Laettner, Tom Gugliotta, Dikembe Mutombo, Alonzo Mourning (up-and-comers); Horace Grant, Detlef Schrempf, Sean Elliott, Glen Rice, Terry Porter (have to be mentioned).

2012: LeBron James, Kevin Durant, Derrick Rose, Dwyane Wade, Dwight Howard, Dirk Nowitzki, Kobe Bryant (superstars); Chris Paul, Russell Westbrook, Carmelo Anthony, Kevin Love, LaMarcus Aldridge (franchise guys); Rajon Rondo, Blake Griffin, Steve Nash, Manu Ginobili (entertaining All-Stars); Tony Parker, Deron Williams, Paul Pierce, Rudy Gay, Chris Bosh, Zach Randolph, Marc Gasol, Pau Gasol, Amar'e Stoudemire, Andrew Bynum (All-Stars); Kevin Garnett, Tim Duncan (tenured All-Stars); Ricky Rubio, Kyrie Irving, Stephen Curry (entertainment X-factors); John Wall, Tyreke Evans, Ty Lawson, Eric Gordon, DeMarcus Cousins, Andrea Bargnani (up-and-comers); Kyle Lowry, Monta Ellis, Andre Iguodala, Josh Smith, Tyson Chandler (have to be mentioned).

Look, I'd still take the 42 signature names from 1993 over the 42 signature names from 2012. But it was closer than I expected, and the 2012 list skews younger and hungrier (a good omen for these next few seasons, especially with a monster draft class arriving in June). It's like anything else — throw enough talent at any problem and you won't notice the warts as much. We already witnessed dozens of games like the ones I attended on Wednesday and Thursday night, when the Clippers split hard-fought, overly physical and undeniably sloppy games against the Lakers (loss) and Grizzlies (win). Did I enjoy those games? Absolutely. Would you have called it "good" basketball? Hell, no. But each night, both teams fought off fatigue and slugged it out. They gave a crap. It was refreshing to watch.

That's the biggest reason why the 2011-12 NBA season managed to remain so compelling. You know what else helped? The league shut down for five months, made its staunchest supporters believe the season was getting canceled … and then, BOOM! Suddenly we were playing hoops again! The NBA crammed its entire signing period into four whirlwind (and genuinely fun) weeks, launched on Christmas (and owned that day like never before),then rolled out seven to 12 games night-after-night-after-night. I don't know anyone who loves the NBA and doesn't secretly (or openly) love this season. It's a quantity-over-quality thing — and remember, the NBA's regular season was never great, anyway. Like six months of halfhearted foreplay. Now? It's four months of furious, energy-sapping foreplay; we're just hoping everyone has enough left for the playoffs; and there's a dangerous edge because it could lead to real disaster. In other words, it's the Eyes Wide Shut sex party of regular seasons.

3 Ways that the NBA talks could demise

If we as basketball fans really are following this NBA collective bargaining closely, Tuesday would have been the day for whiplash.

At long last, there was straight talk about serious movement in the offers. David Stern confidently announced that his owners could have been convinced to offer players 50 percent of basketball revenues -- long thought to have been the magic number. Stern also revealed the owners previously had given up fighting for rollbacks of existing contracts, contracts that are only partially guaranteed and, significantly, a hard cap. 

Seriously, Stern... put a cork in it...seriously.  

In other words, the owners were in the realm of reality on the money issue and had made important concessions on the players' "blood" issues.

And yet ... on that very day, the talks broke apart entirely. Union executive director Billy Hunter says it could be months before the two sides meet again, and the league says it is less than a week from announcing the cancellation of the first two weeks of the regular season.

What is a fan to think? There are three possibilities for what could happen next:
Scenario 1: Bump in the road

Stern says the discussion of splitting BRI in half took place informally, with key personnel from each side agreeing to attempt to go back to their respective groups to try to sell them on the deal. Stern says that while he was talking his owners into it, there was a knock on the door. It was the players, saying their group would not go for a 50/50 deal.

In telling the story, Stern and his deputy, Adam Silver, expressed all manner of surprise and disappointment at this news.

Meanwhile, a union source disputes some of the fine points, saying that first and foremost, it's a major breach of negotiating etiquette to publicly expose the contents of private sidebar conversations. The source also says (and the league denies) that the league did not exactly offer half. Instead, according to the source, it offered to guarantee players 49 percent of revenues, while giving them the right to earn as much as 51 percent of basketball revenues if players could command contracts worth that much.

The union source also maintains that the players did not flatly reject the NBA's offer, as described, but offered another wrinkle in response, to reduce the minimum amount players would be guaranteed from their previous position of 53 percent. (To what, the source wouldn't say.)

However, disgusted as union sources might be with the NBA's handling of the public relations, the fact is that the two sides are not, after all this, very far apart. In fact, they are much closer than they have ever been.

And here's another wrinkle: Two sources in the room agree that the particular players present Tuesday (the list includes Kobe Bryant, Kevin Garnett, Paul Pierce, Theo Ratliff, Maurice Evans, Matt Bonner, Roger Mason Jr., etc.) were particularly strident, more strident than the average player.

Garnett, in particular, has been mentioned as among the uncompromising.

And these are the players who did not play ball with the NBA's offer.

In other words, maybe if the rank-and-file of the players' union were to fully understand the NBA's best offer, the mood would shift.

The NBA says it needs a handshake deal by Monday or it will cancel the first two weeks of the season. Despite all the hard rhetoric, maybe that's still possible. The two sides were hundreds of millions a year apart Tuesday morning. Now they're down to a couple of percentage points. There is a deal to be had, if there's a will to make it happen.
Scenario 2: Now is not the time

Generally, it has been assumed that the passage of time hurts the players, who lose all their NBA income in a lockout. The owners, on the other hand, generally have massive income from other sources and in most cases are losing money by operating their NBA teams anyway.

Billy Hunter says he knows some of the owners have long had the idea of getting players nice and desperate from missed paychecks before forcing them into tough deals.

If feeling the pain of lost income, something that applies to all players and some owners, is the key to getting each side's best offer, maybe this can be a repeat of 1999, with both sides experiencing life without basketball for a few months before the bargaining gets serious enough to end with a handshake.
Scenario 3: Pandora's box

It does not come naturally to the supremely self-assured Stern to express worry or doubt, but he has long expressed the concern that if the players and the owners did not strike a deal to save the full season, it could indeed get very ugly.

To the extent he has explained that comment, he has alluded to the two sides' positions "hardening," something Hunter also has discussed.

But it's more than a hardening. There is also the matter of the courts. These two combatants have a lawsuit active in the Southern District of New York with a hearing set for Nov. 2. They have complaints before the National Labor Relations Board.

And they have a band of agents agitating for decertification, which threatens to not just make talks with the league incredibly complicated and legalistic, but to destabilize the union entirely.

Any one of those legal actions could lead to delays, hassles and indignation.

Most notably, if the union were to deceptive, something Hunter has never been enthusiastic about, it likely would be against the will of the union. Which means players would end up being represented by a lawyer to be named later, likely, sources say, someone who has not been part of the process yet at all. That lawyer presumably would be selected by the agitating agents, and it's anybody's

In other words, there could be an almighty tangle of judges, legal expenses and agitation.

It is entirely possible that a negotiation that is paused over $100 million or so in revenues could disintegrate into $100 million or so in legal fees. 

NFL, union meeting for 3rd day with federal mediator

WASHINGTON -- The NFL and its players' union are meeting for a third consecutive day with a federal mediator.

Future Of The League

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With the CBA expiring on March 3, NFLPA executive George Atallah breaks down how the players and the union view the crucial talks.Story

NFL Commissioner Roger Goodell and NFL Players Association executive director DeMaurice Smith arrived for Sunday's session at about 10 a.m. Neither would comment on the talks.

Various lawyers and other members of both negotiating teams showed up earlier at the Federal Mediation and Conciliation Service office. The director of that U.S. government agency has been mediating the talks.

The sides met for about six hours on both Friday and Saturday. Cohen announced Thursday the groups agreed to the mediation, which is not binding but is meant as a way to initiate progress in the slow and sometimes contentious bargaining.

The current labor deal expires March 3.

Copyright 2011 by The Associated Press