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Sam Smith: Owners Have Won; Jordan Walks Away; Hunter Miscalculated
Smith has some ominous material about David Falk in the article:
Says Falk is a terrorist who likes to blow up teams...
[Chicago Tribune] [SPORTS] [BULLS]
Column
MJ's absence telltale: NBA owners
have won
By Sam Smith
Tribune Pro Basketball Columnist
December 15, 1998
Michael Jordan is a smart guy.
He knows you don't spit into the
wind and you don't gamble with
guys named "Slim."
And now Jordan has learned not to
mess with guys who don't order
their pastrami lean.
Jordan was a fiery union advocate
a month ago. Wonder where he has
gone?
You don't become the icon of
American sport by not being able
to convince everyone it's a
parade when you're being run out
of town.
Despite making every threat he
could, Jordan couldn't get Phil
Jackson back to the Bulls. So he
backed away from that one.
Jordan also knows the NBA players
have lost this fight.
It's one reason you don't see him
around the negotiations anymore,
even on the guest list for the
charity exhibition game being put
on Saturday by his own agent,
David Falk.
The best losers know how to exit
gracefully to fight another day.
NBA union leader Billy Hunter had
a plan. He was convinced that if
he could hold the players in line
by constantly stressing how
little owners thought of them and
by demonizing NBA Commissioner
David Stern, the league would
crumble in the end under the
weight of its potential lost
revenues.
Hunter was convinced that NBC,
which supports the NBA with its
large TV contract--and players'
salaries, too, though the players
rarely acknowledge that--would
force the NBA into a settlement
so as not to lose key national
games starting Christmas Day.
That was Hunter's first big
mistake.
In many ways, NBC needs the NBA
more than the NBA needs the
network. NBC doesn't have pro
football anymore, so it's not
about to risk losing basketball
in three years by bullying the
NBA.
Hunter also made several errors
obvious to any experienced
negotiator. He continually
assured the players the NBA would
fold. In a negotiation, one never
tells a party what its adversary
will eventually do.
And Hunter left himself with no
leverage because he assured the
players they'd be back by
January.
Hunter is a bright lawyer, but he
has never negotiated deals.
So he had to rely on the union's
player executives, led by Patrick
Ewing, Alonzo Mourning, Dikembe
Mutombo and Juwan Howard, all
clients of Falk.
And Falk is a negotiating
terrorist.
Falk's method always has been to
blow up teams, not make them
better.
He took Mourning away from a
young Charlotte team. He tried to
break up Washington by taking
Howard to Miami, but the league
negated the deal. One reason the
Bucks traded Vin Baker was Falk's
threat to move him. Falk even
tried to get Jordan to go to New
York--the effort is described in
a recent Spike Lee book--and only
the Bulls' offer of a $30 million
salary kept Falk from executing
his plan.
Added to the miscalculation was a
natural negative public reaction:
Fans always hate the owners. Now
they hated the players as well
for appearing greedy and out of
touch.
And nobody much liked this next
generation of players anyway.
One theory making the rounds
among conspiracy buffs is that
it's Stern's plan to shut down
the league for a year.
The thinking is with Jordan about
to leave--if he hasn't decided to
already--a downturn was coming.
Force out the greedy young
players whom fans don't like
anyway--Allen Iverson and Latrell
Sprewell come to mind--and start
with some new faces. Let the
union bosses try their own
league, run by agents, and watch
the chaos.
The thinking is that when Stern
got involved in the NBA some 20
years ago, the league was at its
lowest ebb, drug-infested,
populated by players no one liked
and playing a bad, boring game.
Stern built it up once. Maybe he
can do it again.
As for the owners missing a year,
well, Jerry Reinsdorf was a
millionaire long before Jordan
even came to the NBA, as were Abe
Pollin and Jerry Buss and Ted
Turner. Heck, would Turner even
notice there were no NBA games?
It would give him more time to
color old movies.
Many unions have given in after a
fight. The air-traffic
controllers didn't and lost their
jobs. The Federal Express pilots
did and kept their jobs. The
Indianapolis drivers left, and
the Indianapolis 500 continues.
Institutions survive. Workers
come and go.
And this is not about coal miners
fighting black-lung disease or
sweatshop workers seeking decent
conditions. What's the issue?
Without a life-and-death one, a
union's No. 1 job is not to win,
but to keep its members working.
Hunter's are not.
Instead they are intimidated. Has
anyone seen Tim Legler since he
voiced what scores of other
players are asking--why they're
fighting for the
top-salaried--and then had to
apologize the next day?
The players union has made every
possible public relations blunder
short of making Anthony Mason its
spokesman or scheduling the next
union meeting at the riverboat in
Aurora.
The NBA's current offer, which
probably needs another
average-salary exception, which
the league would offer, has
salaries projected at almost $5
million within six years. Average
salaries.
The Los Angeles Dodgers' signing
of Kevin Brown for more than $100
million Saturday only
demonstrated to NBA owners they
cannot give in. Baseball is
staring at an even bigger
meltdown.
Players know in every game there
is a loser. But you lose most
when there's not another game.
Like the card player he is,
Jordan knows when to fold 'em and
walk away. Does anyone else?