Comments on: The NBA’s Restart is in jeopardy. The players have all the power. https://213hoops.com/the-nbas-restart-is-in-jeopardy-the-players-have-all-the-power/ L.A. Clippers News and Analysis Mon, 15 Jun 2020 18:02:49 +0000 hourly 1 https://wordpress.org/?v=5.3.20 By: Lucas Hann https://213hoops.com/the-nbas-restart-is-in-jeopardy-the-players-have-all-the-power/#comment-1153 Mon, 15 Jun 2020 18:02:49 +0000 https://213hoops.com/?p=1040#comment-1153 I’m actually done in Syracuse! I’ll be back in L.A. in about two weeks. Syracuse had its good and its bad, the winters were definitely an experience but I think I endured a little better than most because, growing up in LA, I found the snow exciting, whereas folks who grew up with snow were just bored/irritated by it.

]]> By: Jonee https://213hoops.com/the-nbas-restart-is-in-jeopardy-the-players-have-all-the-power/#comment-1152 Sun, 14 Jun 2020 21:40:14 +0000 https://213hoops.com/?p=1040#comment-1152 Yeah, at this point a bunch of black guys working for white owners while their freedom of movement and other aspects of life are restricted for the entertainment of a largely white audience is not the best look.

How are you liking Syracuse, Lucas? I come from a family of Syracuse grads and have spent a lot of time up there including two years at the college of visual and performing arts. Fun time, but I’ve never seen so much snow. My niece is starting there in the fall.

]]> By: Lucas Hann https://213hoops.com/the-nbas-restart-is-in-jeopardy-the-players-have-all-the-power/#comment-1151 Sun, 14 Jun 2020 00:18:44 +0000 https://213hoops.com/?p=1040#comment-1151 I would bet that the Restart ends up happening–the billions of dollars on the line for players, which they can use to further activism efforts, likely outweighs any contribution they could make to the movement by sitting out. And while it’s certainly true that games will offer the public a distraction from focusing on pressing issues such as racism and police brutality, we’re talking 6 weeks from now. The MLB could be back by then, the NFL will return shortly thereafter in August. People are going to have distractions if they want them.

I think that by playing, the players can leverage their national TV and media attention to keep the movement in the public consciousness more than would happen by sitting out. So, I would expect that between that and the money on the line, the players will follow the thinking of guys like Austin who are committed to playing and social justice. But even if holding out doesn’t happen, players like Kyrie raising their voices now can help shape how Black Lives Matter and other activist campaigns are worked into the broadcasts, coverage, and messaging during the Restart.

]]> By: mlslaw1 https://213hoops.com/the-nbas-restart-is-in-jeopardy-the-players-have-all-the-power/#comment-1150 Sat, 13 Jun 2020 21:35:06 +0000 https://213hoops.com/?p=1040#comment-1150 The way you explained it Lucas shows the players that passing on this restart now will have very serious negative $$ ramifications down the line.

From my perspective and knowing that the league is composed of about 75% black players, the impediment in not returning is as follows:

returning to play means entertaining a predominantly white audience that many perceive to have racial bias vs. blacks.

How do you swallow doing that as a black player and how do you weigh the down the line financial hit against the option to sit out and fight the good social injustice fight.

This is Silver’s biggest challenge yet, bigger that DTS by far. can he convince the players that they can both return AND further the injustice cause? He and the league have to really be willing to show the players that they are fully committed to the cause.

My money’s on Silver.

]]> By: Lucas Hann https://213hoops.com/the-nbas-restart-is-in-jeopardy-the-players-have-all-the-power/#comment-1149 Sat, 13 Jun 2020 14:52:19 +0000 https://213hoops.com/?p=1040#comment-1149 Yeah, I think this is what will happen… but ultimately the NBA needs to get the vast majority of players on board with coming to Orlando. If every playoff team is missing a couple of rotation guys, and a few stars sit out, it is going to have a big impact on how the remainder of the season is viewed. If there are a few guys who decide to stay home (whatever their reasoning is), and they’re mostly role players who are mostly from non-contenders, the league can just let them opt out and be replaced. But it’s a lot harder to say what will happen if Donovan Mitchell didn’t come for Utah or if the Lakers lost Dwight Howard and Avery Bradley.

]]> By: Peter Goul https://213hoops.com/the-nbas-restart-is-in-jeopardy-the-players-have-all-the-power/#comment-1148 Sat, 13 Jun 2020 13:00:27 +0000 https://213hoops.com/?p=1040#comment-1148 Great info and analysis. Is it possible that the NBPA allows each player to make their own decision and teams would then play with the those who opt in? I can see issues with this idea. No one would bat an eye if Amir Coffey decides not to play but if it’s Kawhi or Lebron then it’s headline news and would render the playoffs meaningless. Plus, there may be peer pressure to play or not to play….just throwing this out since it sounds like the majority of players do want to play.

]]> By: chogokin https://213hoops.com/the-nbas-restart-is-in-jeopardy-the-players-have-all-the-power/#comment-1147 Fri, 12 Jun 2020 23:00:13 +0000 https://213hoops.com/?p=1040#comment-1147 I’ve purposely avoided NBA news for essentially the last 3 months because the season suspension hit me really hard – just trying to keep up w/ any kind of NBA-related topics was painful for me. The Clips were climbing in the standings, getting healthy, and soon we were gonna have the playoffs to look forward to, but then WHAM – global pandemic, protests against racism/police brutality, rioting/looting, and then ample evidence of police brutality in response to the protests of…police brutality.

Anyways, I can see the logic behind the owners’ and the players’s positions on this, but I really, really, reeeeaaaaaally hope the league and the players figure something out to finish up this season because frankly 2020 needs something, *anything,* to actually go right. I think NBA ownership and the league (Silver in particular) has been surprisingly competent re: reopening though, so I am leaning towards them being able to iron out whatever safety concerns the players have (I fully expect the Bubble to have more rigorous testing and accurate results than the actual state of FLA itself). The problem is, if the player concerns are social (e.g. isolation from family/freinds/social life), then we’re kinda screwed because there’s really nothing the league can do about that…

Thanks as always for keeping us up to date on all things Clippers – I can’t begin to imagine how tough this situation has been on all of you guys, especially considering how new this site was right when the NBA pulled the plug.

]]>