lockout negotiations

[Alex Wang <awang@mit.edu>]

The union position mystifies me. It seems like Billy Hunter's 
"negotiating technique" is to act clueless and set pro basketball
on the path to ruin, in the hopes that the league will bail him out
and settle the lockout favorably. I'm not sure if the players 
understand this because they're going to be hurt more than the 
owners by this sort of strategy. 

Hunter contends that the league's luxury tax proposal would force 
90-95% of the players to play for the minimum. If any of the media
reports about that proposal are true, his statement is bizarre.
The luxury tax supposedly only applies to contracts signed with the 
Bird exemption over the league average salary. How does this lead
to 95% of the players playing for the minimum? Or does he mean that
this will happen if the hard cap kicks in after the trial period?

I would have thought that a reasonable negotiating stance would have
been to counterpropose some compromise numbers for the luxury tax
and get rid of the hard cap provision but he didn't even consider it. 
The "negotiations" up to this point baffle me. If it were like bargaining 
for a car, it would be something like this:
  STERN (the customer): I am buying a car for my wife (the owners).
	She wants a Ferrari but she tends to overspend because she wants 
	to impress her friends. The sticker price for the car is $300,000 
	which is too high. Let's negotiate. I offer $250,000.
  HUNTER (the car dealer): Outrageous! I would starve to death on	
	that income. I won't accept less to $500,000! And your wife should
	have more self-control! 
  (Stern walks out in a huff and returns a month later.)
  STERN: Alright, I'm willing to negotiate. I offer $260,000.
  HUNTER: OK, now I understand that $300,000 for a car is too expensive for
	you so here is my reasonable counterproposal. I'll give you the car
	without air conditioning for $299,000. To discourage your wife 
	from spending more than $300K, I'll impose a luxury tax on air 
	conditioners of 50%. 
  STERN: We can work with the luxury tax. How about a completely 
	unequipped car for $260,000 and a luxury tax of 50% on A/C,
	100% on a sunroof, 200% on the GPS navigator? And if she still 
	buys this car, next time we'll agree that the car should be $270K. 
  HUNTER: What!? Under these conditions your wife will buy a Geo and
	I will starve to death! 

Alex