The Golden Age of Basketball

Chapter 479 Responsibilities
Everyone has different responsibilities in different positions.

Weltz's responsibility was to ensure that no one froze to death in the Chicago snow during All-Star Weekend.

He was responsible for organizing the All-Star Game to proceed normally in bad weather and an old venue.

This was a challenging and demanding task, keeping Weltz extremely busy. He constantly monitored the weather in the Chicago area and continuously contacted various suppliers to ensure an adequate supply of food and heating supplies.

Weltz's work was challenging enough, but it paled in comparison to David Stern's.

David Stern had to consider the survival of the entire NBA, whether the league could survive the storm of labor negotiations.

Before the Suns' drug scandal broke out, Stern's top priority was negotiating a new collective bargaining agreement.

The labor agreement signed in 1984 will expire in June 1988. It was the result of hard-fought negotiations between labor and management, and the establishment of the wage cap was one of Stern's proudest achievements.

Through years of maneuvering with Larry Fleischer, he single-handedly brought about the creation of the salary cap rule, successfully curbing the ever-expanding team spending, improving the league's financial situation, and allowing many teams on the verge of bankruptcy to breathe and revive.

Now that the agreement has expired, serious disagreements have arisen between labor and management again.

Capitalists, represented by Stern, believe that the wage cap system has proven to be a very good rule design.

It maintains the team's financial balance and ensures that the strength of each team is relatively equal, making it increasingly difficult for super teams to emerge.

The labor side, represented by Larry Fleischer, agreed that the wage cap system was a good design, but they came to the completely opposite conclusion.

They believe that because the salary cap system is so good, it has completed its historical mission, saved the league's finances, and can now be swept into the dustbin of history and die a natural death.

Therefore, in the contact negotiations in September 1987, the players' union, represented by Fleischer, put forward three major demands:

1. Completely abolish the salary cap, with no upper limit on contracts.

2. Abolish the NBA draft system and allow teams to discover and develop new talent at their own discretion.

3. Remove transfer restrictions, allowing players to freely join their desired teams without being tied to their parent club.

These three demands are tantamount to undermining the very foundation of the NBA, aiming to destroy the very basis of the league's existence.

If these three suggestions are implemented, the NBA will become an organization similar to a boxing association, such as the WBA, IBF, WBO, etc.

There is no employment, subordination, or constraint relationship between these boxing organizations and boxers; it is simply a cooperative relationship.

I'll organize the competition, you'll play in it, and we'll split the profits.

This is exactly the result that NBA players, especially star players, want to see.

They want the freedom of a boxer, to have their own brand, and to attract fans and make money with their skills.

Although NBA salaries are high, playing for the league, with 82 regular season games and a dozen or so playoff games a year, is like a rigid work schedule that forces players to complete their tasks.

Without a salary cap, star players can earn more; with a salary cap, star players are at a disadvantage.

For superstars like Jordan, Gan Guoyang, and Bird, fans buy tickets to watch the games specifically because of them, and it wouldn't be an exaggeration to say that their salaries are higher than the entire rest of the team.

However, the salary cap does not allow this situation to occur, which would be equivalent to star players using their fame to earn money and pay salaries for lower-level players.

Of course, basketball is different from boxing. Basketball is a team sport. Without a team, without mid-to-lower-level players, top stars are like trees without roots.

The salary cap is a relatively minor point of contention, after all, the NBA has survived without a salary cap in the past.

Stern and Fleischer were relatively mild on the salary cap controversy, a debate they had been arguing about for years.

But removing restrictions on the draft and transfers would be digging up the foundation of the NBA's ownership.

Stern and the investors were firmly opposed and refused to make any concessions.

The NBA draft is a major feature of the league and a key system that distinguishes American professional sports from sports leagues in other countries and regions.

From an employment perspective, the talent show system is actually quite unethical.

An employee, upon reaching the required working age and meeting the job requirements, is selected by a company and told to come work for them.

If an employee does not want to go, he will lose the opportunity to work directly in this industry. He cannot go to other companies in the same industry, nor can he participate in next year's recruitment.

The reason why the NBA and other North American professional leagues can implement this unconventional system and package the draft into a grand event every year ultimately lies in the NBA's monopolistic position and the high salaries inherent in professional sports, which mask this rogue nature. The rogue nature of the NBA draft system is also reflected in its indiscriminate global player selection; in recent years, the NBA has increasingly selected overseas players.

They don't care whether the selected player has a contract or plays for another team, they will just pick you directly.

If you're willing to come, I'll give you a contract; if you're not willing to come, I'll still find a way to lure you here.

NBA teams are willing to pay buyout fees, which seems fair, but from a basketball perspective, even if the original team receives the buyout fee, they still suffer a loss.

In this respect, the NBA is similar to the United States in attracting scientific and technological talent. It uses its economic and cultural appeal to gather talent from all over the world for its own use without having to pay the cost of training them.

This exploitative draft system is a major reason why the NBA has been able to grow and thrive.

Because the league and teams don't have to spend a single penny on discovering and developing young talent, they can reap the benefits without lifting a finger, and incidentally make the NBA the most entertaining, legendary, and lucrative professional league, further increasing its attraction to talent across the United States and even the world, thus creating a positive cycle.

Abolishing the draft system and removing restrictions on player transfers would break this cycle.

NBA teams need to negotiate contracts with different players, discover and develop young players themselves, and even build youth teams like European football and basketball leagues.

Fleischer's "fierce" proposal stemmed from two main reasons: firstly, to secure better benefits and a more lenient collective bargaining agreement for the players; secondly, he harbored greater ambitions.

He envisions establishing a global basketball league that allows outstanding basketball players from around the world to move freely, lets the strongest teams compete against each other, and makes the NBA championship truly deserving of the title "world champion."

Such a global, highly fluid basketball league is clearly not a role that the NBA, a commercial league based on American laws and structured as a corporation, can assume.

It should be like the NCAA, an organizer and referee of an event, rather than being both an organizer and referee and a participant at the same time (the NBA is actually controlled by the team's board of directors).

How could the NBA owners possibly agree to such ambitions? It would be digging their own grave and turning their own life around.

If you, Fleischer, want to play this game, start your own branch and create another ABA if you're so capable.

The NBA will absolutely not compromise on this.

The back-and-forth between the two sides began at last year's All-Star Game.

Midway through the season, Stern and Fleischer were briefly united in their hatred of the Suns' drug scandal.

During this time, Stern realized that Larry Fleischer probably didn't want the NBA to die out either, otherwise he wouldn't have gone to such lengths.

Therefore, Fleischer's three demands were nothing more than a means to threaten employers into making greater concessions to employees.

Therefore, the investors, represented by Stern, not only disagreed with these three demands, but also refused to budge on the amount of the salary cap and profit sharing, only seeking to maintain the status quo and insisting on a head-on confrontation.

In this situation, Larry Fleischer played his trump card:

He wants to dissolve the players' union and allow NBA teams and players to negotiate individually and sign individual contracts with each player, instead of being bound by a uniform collective bargaining agreement.

All 276 active NBA players received this notification before the All-Star Game: all union members will vote to decide the future direction of the union.

Before the union members vote, the first step is to have the players' representatives vote, and the representatives agree to initiate the dissolution vote. Then, all members vote to determine the outcome.

Most of the player representatives are NBA stars, and Gan Guoyang is one of them.

Therefore, this All-Star Game is a time for player representatives to gather together and discuss important matters.

Many player uprisings in NBA history have taken place during the All-Star Game, which is why owners both love and fear the All-Star Game.

After being notified and arriving at the Hyatt Regency Chicago, Gan Guoyang immediately went to Fleischer to find out the details of the matter.

Fleischer always trusted Gan Guoyang and told him everything from beginning to end.

“You are the players’ representative, and I need your support,” Fleischer and Gan Guoyang said. “If possible, persuade those swing voters who may be afraid to fight the owners because they are content with the status quo.”

Gan Guoyang looked out at the swirling snow and said, "Protecting the players' welfare is the union's responsibility, and I will definitely support you. At worst, we'll form a new NBA and stop dealing with these owners!"

Fleischer laughed heartily; with Gan Guoyang's support, Fleischer felt much more at ease.

He knew that Forrest Gump had a high level of prestige among the players, and that anyone who wanted to oppose him would likely face difficulties with Forrest Gump by their side.

(End of this chapter)