NBA Players Seeking Legal Way Out of Chinese Basketball Association Contracts

When players money got funny and there was no end date in sight for the NBA Lockout, players began signing contracts with the the Chinese Basketball Association. Now that things are moving forward, these guys would like to come back. But not so fast…

According to Yahoo! Sports, Denver Nuggets free agents J.R. Smith(notes) and Wilson Chandler(notes) are still pursuing ways to get out of their Chinese Basketball Association contracts but have yet to find a prompt avenue back to the NBA.

Smith and Chandler play for the Zhejiang Chouzhou Golden Bulls and Zhejiang Guangsha Lions, respectively, and sources said those teams could be willing to agree to steep buyouts to let the players return to the NBA. The players would have to return all the salary they’ve made, plus agent fees and an additional $1 million to satisfy owners – but that still won’t assure them they could play in the NBA.

As a member of FIBA, the government-run Chinese Basketball Association would still control the players’ letters of clearance, and sources in China insist the league has no interest in allowing the NBA players to leave before season’s end in March. NBA teams can’t sign free agents without letters of clearance showing the players are free of contract breaches elsewhere in the world.

Read More: http://sports.yahoo.com/nba/news?slug=aw-wojnarowski_nba_free_agent_buzz_120511

NBA players reject latest offer; union files ‘disclaimer of interest’

The NBA Players Association announced Monday it had rejected the latest collective bargaining agreement proposal by the league and will file an antitrust suit against the league.

Los Angeles Lakers guard Kobe Bryant arrives for a meeting in New York on Monday. Player representatives from NBA teams met to discuss the league's proposal for a new collective bargaining agreement. Picture: Seth Wenig/The Associated Press

All 30 NBA teams were represented at the players meeting in New York.

The player’s association will file a “disclaimer of interest” with the courts and become a trade association.

Disclaimer of interest (also called a renunciation), is a term that describes an attempt by a person to renounce their legal right to benefit.

The renunciation will pave the way for the players to file an antitrust lawsuit against the league.

Monday’s events will now seriously jeopardize the  entire 2011-12 season. The league has canceled games through mid-December, and it’s likely more cancellations will be forthcoming.

 

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First Two Weeks of NBA Season Canceled

Sticking to his deadline, NBA Commissioner David Stern erased the first two weeks of the season after negotiations failed to produce a new labor deal and warned that more games were in jeopardy of being cut.

“With every day that goes by, I think we need to look at further reductions in what’s left of the season,” Stern said.

The cancellations mark the NBA’s first work stoppage since the 1998-99 season was reduced to 50 games.

Read the story on the Huffington Post.

NBA Lockout Update: NBA Pulls Player Images from their Network and Website

The Wall Street Journal released an article in today’s paper about the NBA lockout that began earlier this month. News, inquiries, and commentary about the labor dispute has dominated the internet, including NBA.com and official team websites.

But the National Basketball Assoiation is keeping the players out of this…

According to the WSJ, the league removed all images and videos of current players from its digital properties and its television network, NBA TV, after the NBA’s collective bargaining agreement expired at the start of the month.

Popular video replays showing top players such as Dwight Howard and Blake Griffin have been replaced with archival footage of NBA games, photos of retired players and intense news coverage of the lockout.

On individual NBA team websites, generic team logos have taken the place of player head shots.

The NBA is trying go avoid profiting from the still images and videos of the players themselves during what is expected to be a very long lockout. Advertising on those sites is based on page views.

“We do not think it is appropriate to be using video and photography of our current players at this time,” said NBA spokesman Mike Bass. People close to the NBA say that the league doesn’t believe it should continue profiting off players by using their images online after locking them out over issues of compensation and revenue sharing.

While there are some concerns that traffic to the NBA’s digital properties might decline, TBS, which operates these digital businesses (as well as its TV network) said it isn’t concerned about losing player images at a time when fans are fixated on the work stoppage.

“It’s what fans want to read about. They want to know what’s next, and whether that reporting is as interesting as video highlights from the previous season isn’t really for me to say,” said Scooter Vertino, vice president of content for NBA Digital at Turner, which is part of Time Warner Inc.

Turner has also beefed up NBA history on the site.

On Friday, a top news item chronicled the death of Armen Gilliam, a long-time NBA player known as “The Hammer.”

On Thursday, the home page of NBA.com featured a prominent image of Tom “Satch” Sanders, a veteran player who retired in 1973 and will be inducted into the Basketball Hall of Fame next month.

Earlier in the week, a news item covered treatment of Kobe Bryant’s knee injury—but without any photographs of him.

“Historically, strikes have a negative impact on fan response,” says Jessica Reif Cohen, a media analyst at BofA Merrill Lynch Global Research. “To me, the issue is that fans get disgusted when there is a strike, and that can create larger issues.”

WSJ reported at the revenue NBA.com takes in from advertising is small compared with the roughly $1 billion the league’s TV-distribution partners make in advertising revenue each year, according to industry analysts. According to estimates provided by Barclays Capital, NBA.com took in nearly $22 million in advertising revenue last year.

But web revenue has been growing. 2010’s profit represents an 88% increase from a year earlier, when NBA.com produced $11.7 million in ad revenue. In 2008, it took in just over $6 million.

NBA.com receives millions of vistors each month.

In May, NBA.com attracted 12.2 million unique visitors, up 47% from May 2009, when it had 8.3 million, according to research firm comScore Inc.

Any shift in traffic patterns on NBA.com has, so far, not affected advertising on the site, according to a person close to NBA.com who is familiar with its deal structures, according to the WSJ.

NBA.com hasn’t seen any immediate loss in sponsorships for the coming season, this person added, noting that the site is proceeding with deals for next season but “incorporating more flexible options for our advertisers during this time.”

The NBA’s Mr. Bass declined to comment on whether the league had seen any changes in the traffic patterns on its sites.

Source: Associated Press and Wall Street Journal