stashing assets for the 2023 nba offseason

also, james harden has twice i think now turned down extensions to steer himself to different teams! lebron went year to year for a while with the cavs so he could extract himself at the right time. it’s not like it’s unheard of to trade financial security for short-term flexibility.

― call all destroyer, Friday, September 29, 2023 1:43 PM (four minutes ago)

i kinda look at harden from the opposite perspective of he kept turning down money expecting the pot of gold would be there at the end of the rainbow and then he got to the end of the rainbow and his team was like "whoops sorry you're old now." he made several poor decisions along the way, but i'm not sure i'd consider him a success story for the path that is turning down guaranteed money for flexibility.

i also think lebron is in a different class of player where he could rightfully always assume a huge offer would be there for him even if he suffered a catastrophic injury because his track record of indestructibility (and greatness) was so unimpeachable. i'm not sure that's actually a viable plan for all but a handful of players (bron, steph, prime kawhi etc) that i'm not sure dame is actually a part of. or, i could see how when he was offered an extra 2 years and $122 million at age 34, he thought about what could happen if he turned it down and pictured more how it played out for harden than how it has for lebron

sorry i meant age 32 not age 34

harden successfully got the trades he wanted but then the big last contract eluded him, which are not unrelated

brad beal got the huge deal and did not care if he was traded or not lol, the zen earner of the nba

yeah i’m not saying either example is perfect just that there is precedent for superstars doing something other than grabbing all the money as it’s presented. i can certainly understand the case you’re making from lillard’s perspective

It will be super funny if Giannis doesn't re-sign (sorry frogbs)

― reggae mike love (polyphonic), Friday, September 29, 2023 12:58 PM (five minutes ago) bookmarkflaglink

look I take him at his word that he's gonna stick around as long as Milwaukee remains competitive, but I'm also aware things are set up for them to be in a pretty dire spot in 3-5 years so I really don't mind if he bolts after that

i cannot reconcile the idea that this makes giannis more likely to re-sign there when he has all but hung a banner from the bucks arena saying "i'm not gonna waste the final years of my prime on this old ass roster"

i guess if we're to believe what he's said publicly -- that he needs to see "investment in winning" -- then yeah this is all he would need to re-sign. but if we're to believe that it's all coded language allowing him to say "i'm going to go to a younger team" than this should only push him further away

who knows why he was so laser focused on miami, he was on record as wanting to play with giannis but for whatever reason, maybe cause he didnt want to join a championship teams as a #2 no less, it was miami or bust

― lag∞n, Friday, September 29, 2023 1:53 PM (six minutes ago)

i doubt he or his agent ever considered the possibility that the bucks would trade for him. they were just like the rest of us

i think what happened was he & his agent surveyed the league at the beginning of this whole thing and looked at the likely trade partner suspects -- miami, philly, clippers, nets -- and concluded (rightly!) that the only one who would give him a real shot at a title was the heat. i think the only other team in the league (aside from denver but they don't count) that would've given him a better shot at a title than the heat is boston, and they clearly iced them out for whatever reason i'm sure we could come up w/ several. i don't think any other team in the league in either conference offered the same championship proposition as the heat. except the bucks. congrats to the bucks, it was a shrewd trade

i don't think anyone has argued that they shouldn't act in their own self interest. the question is whether dame was wrong to take their money and still ask out -- the implication of a number of recent posts -- and i just flatly disagree with that

just speaking for myself, I don’t think he was “wrong” in the sense that I hold the owner-player relationship sacred or anything, I just don’t think he deserves some sort of special sympathy! he fucked around and found out, luckily for him he will almost certainly be playing in the finals for the first time in his career now, everyone is happy! (except heat fans)

i don't think he deserves *special* sympathy, but like i said, sympathy for one of the sides does seep out in one direction or another...

i understand he isn't an auto worker, but your sympathies are going to seep out one way or another, and i know which way mine run, that's all i'm saying here. to each his own!

also to state things more plainly from my POV, I don’t really see this as a labor issue tbh, my allegiance is to the league/sport as an entertainment product. I can be missed with this labor relations elite capture stuff tbh

like the 12th man types sure, I don’t need to really be spending my time getting out my hammer and sickles for the superstars

otm

tho on the other hand i do stand with the players because i appreciate them as artists, also they are my friends

big picture truth is that the players benefit from the owners who slosh a bunch of money into the league that ordinarily wouldnt be there if it didnt function as a toy for them

like the 12th man types sure, I don’t need to really be spending my time getting out my hammer and sickles for the superstars

― k3vin k., Friday, September 29, 2023 2:18 PM (seven minutes ago)

well that's good. we can't have your hammer and sickles being overused.

as for me, so much of the NBA now is defined by the relationship between the owners and the stars that the issue of labor in a general sense is woven into the consumption of the sport in a way that is not true for any of its competitors. i'm not sitting here saying that watching the NBA is or should be akin to taking a grad level econ course, but like the entire discussion about player rest that is causing a crisis across the league to the point of re-defining the parameters of historical achievement in the sport ... that's a labor problem dressed up as an entertainment problem. so you can say that you don't see the dame saga as a "labor issue" but in reality the crux of entire thing goes back to changes to the CBA, which of course is literally is a labor agreement. and i wish that the CBA as a labor document didn't define discussions of the NBA to the degree that it does, but there's no way anymore to talk about player transactions w/o bringing the CBA to bear, because of the owners attempting to further tighten their grip on how the sport operates. it would've been great for everyone to talk about potential dame trades w/o having to understand how the salary cap works, but the NBA is a league where labor and entertainment are a big tangled ball of yarn. so it is obviously your prerogative to say "i'm just here for the entertainment!" -- which i don't buy for a single second, btw -- but that feels like an intentionally blinkered worldview, to state the obvious

the players doing good they dont need anyones help, they could consider giving it tho

i think about barry jackson from the miami herald who is the longest tenured and prob most recognizable legendary sports reporter in miami history... he goes by @flasportsbuzz on twitter i'm sure you guys have seen his name. i read his columns 25 years ago when i was eating cereal before school and stuff, he's still tweeting up a storm every day, his coverage of all miami sports is frankly borderline psychotic.

anyway, so much of his coverage of heat over the last handful of years, given the nature of the franchise, has been about potential (and actual) player & star acquisitions, and what is possible under the salary cap, who can be used as salary match and why, who can't, when can someone get traded vs when they can't, the timing of extensions, cap holds, player options etc. all of this stuff is at its core a labor issue -- contractual business between teams, agents, and players. it shouldn't be at the forefront of the entertainment product, it should be hidden away in the darkness like movie star salaries so we can all just enjoy the final product. but i find the two inextricable these days, and i bring up the barry jackson example bcuz this is the most mainstream, old school sports coverage in the city, the kinda stuff my dad is seeing and texting me about. this is not like listening to a nate duncan podcast. i'm just talking out loud here, not chiding anyone, but i do think it's worth taking stock of how much the CBA (labor agreement) has infiltrated the NBA's entertainment product

its a labor issue with zero material urgency, its like if wall street guys had a union, also imo its been really well gamified, part of the reason why people follow this stuff so closely is that its interesting, trades etc in the nba are so much better than in any other sport partially because of this stuff

its a labor issue with zero material urgency, its like if wall street guys had a union

i disagree w/ this bcuz i do genuinely believe in the proxy debate aspect. i think there are a lot of ppl out there who might not ever care to discuss amazon worker unionization who may instead have a parallel discussion about athletes vs owners, and perhaps changing minds on one subject helps change minds on the other. i'm trying not to be moon-eyed about the power of sports, but i do think athletes, even given their wealth, can be useful stand ins for "real" workers given that mainstream debate about actual labor doesn't really exist in america (save for intermittent interruptions like the hollywood strikes). it would actually be hugely beneficial for america if wall street guys had a union, even if the "material urgency" of their lives is nonexistent compared to that of auto workers

also imo its been really well gamified, part of the reason why people follow this stuff so closely is that its interesting, trades etc in the nba are so much better than in any other sport partially because of this stuff

― lag∞n, Friday, September 29, 2023 3:24 PM (ten minutes ago)

this is absolutely true, and all sides -- players, teams, agents, media -- has benefited from the gamification of transactions in a huge way. tho i think the league is coming to grips now w/ the other side of that sword. they made the offseason more dramatic than the regular season, and so now as far as the actual games go people only care about the playoffs, because that is what defines the debates that feed into the drama. it seems like the longterm stakeholders (the league and the owners) are realizing now that the long tail of this dynamic is probably not so good even as everyone who gets paid off the league in some way has gorged themselves at the trough for 10+ years now

the only way that athletes wall st guys could help the labor movement is if they were actually in solidarity with labor instead of being good soldiers of capital, i dont think their example does much its just more celebritization of serious issues and hoping that pr vibes will somehow get the job done in place of a real fight

things have been happening in labor recently some sort of nascent groundswell general support for unions is way up i dont think ive heard one person mention unionized athletes as an inspiration, people do talk about starbucks baristas tho

the only way that athletes wall st guys could help the labor movement is if they were actually in solidarity with labor instead of being good soldiers

i dont consider the black isrealists to be labor tho i do find them more interesting than nike executives

I think it’s important to note that the state of the current cba has basically squeezed the nba middle class, as far as it goes, basically out of the league. The future of labor in the nba increasingly is the powerful stars bloating their own contracts, a handful of very rich secondary players, and everyone else getting min deals. I think this speaks to where the powerful players’ solidarity lies (it is not with labor)

i dont understand why the nba bench guys allow that to happen there are more of them than the stars

tho i guess its pretty easy for those guys to be out of the league if lebron et al doesnt like them, but still

they should strike

or stop electing chris paul union pres

i dont consider the black isrealists to be labor tho i do find them more interesting than nike executives

― lag∞n, Friday, September 29, 2023 4:02 PM (five minutes ago)

kyrie gave six figures to standing rock pipeline protestors, tried to quash the bubble on i believe two separate occasions, gave over a million dollars to WNBA players during the pandemic, and took a brave stance on behalf of the unvaccinated workers of new york city! the most labor forward NBA player we have also being one of the most unlikable psychos is a reason why the NBA is great

things have been happening in labor recently some sort of nascent groundswell general support for unions is way up i dont think ive heard one person mention unionized athletes as an inspiration, people do talk about starbucks baristas tho

― lag∞n, Friday, September 29, 2023 3:50 PM (twelve minutes ago)

maybe i'm being naive but while i don't think the conversations are causal in most instances, i would consider them correlative. like i think women who are invested in the equality of women athletes in basketball, soccer, college sports etc would tell you that those fights are not separate from their own. professional male athletes are treated much better but their issues as far as labor goes are not irrelevant imo to the larger cause tho i would of course never argue that such discussions are an adequate stand in "for a real fight"

kyrie gave six figures to standing rock pipeline protestors, tried to quash the bubble on i believe two separate occasions, gave over a million dollars to WNBA players during the pandemic, and took a brave stance on behalf of the unvaccinated workers of new york city! the most labor forward NBA player we have also being one of the most unlikable psychos is a reason why the NBA is great

― J0rdan S., Friday, September 29, 2023 4:15 PM (two minutes ago) bookmarkflaglink

i mean it does sound good when say it that way but these are the actions of a lone wolf philanthropist not labor

i dont understand why the nba bench guys allow that to happen there are more of them than the stars

― lag∞n, Friday, September 29, 2023 4:04 PM (twelve minutes ago)

i think the union's argument (to its members but also in general) is that the new CBA is structured in a way that funnels more money overall to the players side in terms of how the TV money and all that income is split up. that the contracts will all be larger in the aggregate not just because there is more money flowing into the league but also because of how the union fought for it to be split up. and while it's probably true that the players overall will get more money it also seems evident that a certain number of players who think a payday awaits them in free agency will find that the money has already been allocated to more famous, more important players

differing agendas w/in a union based on real or implied strata w/in the membership group is intrinsic to all unions i think. but the sports leagues are also unique insofar as we know incontrovertibly that lebron and KD are more valuable to the NBA than the rank and file, which isn't really true for assembly line workers or teachers or what not. the CBA as approved by the union 100% acknowledges that reality -- it's basically like the rank and file pay a tax to the stars for making the league what it is. i think i would take the position that acknowledging that imbalance w/ such a structure is what keeps the union together, as opposed to it being a commentary on to the degree to which the star players side w/ power over labor. but i would also be curious the unvarnished thoughts from non-star players who are involved w/ the union on whether they think guys like lebron and cp3 are genuinely looking out for the rank and file in CBA negotiations

this thread has delivered today, thank u ilh 🙏

psh more free labor I’m demanding a trade to I love baseball

worth noting that the nba cba is kind of a strange analogue for other sorts of labor agreements in that half the rules in it are there to keep the owners, who both cooperate and compete, from stomping all over each other, and in particular do things like try to protect undesirable market portland from desirable market miami. that the players are bystanders in a lot of this is maybe its own labor issue but pro sports in america is such a weird ecosystem, it's hard to compare it to other things.

most workers cant dunk

but yeah, it is an interesting discussion to what extent we are all transaction-brained as fans of this sport and how that informs the discourse. it's not unreasonable to frame a lot of the things that happen in the nba offseason as labor issues but there are also a lot of different types of labor issues, some of which are probably more important than others.

most workers cant dunk

― lag∞n, Friday, September 29, 2023 9:09 PM (thirty-nine seconds ago) bookmarkflaglink

lol this too

thought america ran on dunkin tbh

most workers cant run tbh

celtics shd pick him up

Can confirm Spurs are buying out veteran Reggie Bullock, per sources.

Spurs roster sits at 19 (with two-way deals) heading into training camp.

— Andrew Lopez (@_Andrew_Lopez) September 30, 2023

mb theyre going after him tho

The Celtics’ pursuit of Jrue Holiday remains alive, I’m told. But there’s still a significant gap.

— Adam Himmelsbach (@AdamHimmelsbach) September 30, 2023

why not both

interesting approach for brian wright to koolaid man wallbreak into every opportunity to facilitate trades and take back marginal draft capital and then cut the veteran players they get back in the deal bc they have around 34 teenagers that need minutes

i get it tho, cam payne and reggie bullock are solid bench guys but not worth a draft-pick centered trade when the other team would have to salary dump to make the trade work. hope that dallas pick swap in 2030 becomes someone cool.

shouldnt the spurs be looking for situations where they get salary dumped on them in exchange for picks (except for the fact that they have too many guys)

i dont mind the strategy in general, but they need to consolidate some of those 2nd rounders into something that has a chance of actually improving their roster. the dejounte, poeltl, and derozan trades were all good at bringing some potentially quality draft spots (the 2024 TOR 1rp they have is only top 6 protected for ex) but a lot of these trades (cam payne, devonte graham) leave them with decentish money that gets wasted in service of 2nd rounders. feels like there are bigger fish out there idk.

also

The Celtics are trading Robert Williams, Malcolm Brogdon, 2024 GSW 1st, 2029 unprotected BOS first to the Blazers, sources tell ESPN. https://t.co/gx53jyH1RG

— Adrian Wojnarowski (@wojespn) October 1, 2023

The Celtics are trading Robert Williams, Malcolm Brogdon, 2024 GSW 1st, 2029 unprotected BOS first to the Blazers, sources tell ESPN. https://t.co/gx53jyH1RG

— Adrian Wojnarowski (@wojespn) October 1, 2023