David Stern on a Power Trip: Threatens to Cancel Season

NEW YORK — After approaching the NBA Labor talks like a child deciding whether or not to jump in a pool, the owners and the union are finally meeting consecutively as the time ticks away on the NBA season starting on time.

Now, mind you, just because the two sides are actually growing a pair and meeting doesn’t necessarily equal progress. Getting the lockout ended is a long and strenuous process that won’t be solved come Monday. However this isn’t going to stop the two sides from meeting, as they did yesterday and today, again on Friday and possibly again this weekend.

The meetings broke for today and will not take place tomorrow so both sides can regroup and summon their collective bargaining groups to New York for what is being seen as a crucial stretch of this current lockout. But don’t be fooled and think the two sides are meeting so consecutively because they are beginning to like each other again.

“I think it points more toward the calendar than actually being able to measure progress,” said players’ association president Derek Fisher. “It points to the realities that we face with our calendar and that if we can’t find a way to get some common ground really, really soon, then the time of starting the regular season at its scheduled date is going to be in jeopardy big-time.”

Friday should be an interesting day as the union is pulling out the big gun Marvel style and summoning some of their biggest names to join the meeting. The Heat’s Dwayne Wade has committed to attending the meetings and Derek Fisher firmly believes

that, much like the recent Marvel Civil War comic series where all the big name superheros met in one place, the superheros of the NBA like Kobe Bryant, LeBron James and the bunch will show their faces and try to reach a resolution.

It’s also about damn time these guys got up and started to work towards progress this aggressively. The way the NBA is going about the lockout, on both ends, is akin to a high school student putting off his studying for the final exam until the night before he must pass it. With the regularly scheduled November 1st quickly approaching, David Stern is using the scare tactic buzz words to manufacture progress.

“I’m focused on let’s get the two committees in and see whether they can either have a season or not have a season,” said Stern, “and that’s what’s at risk this weekend.”

It’s amazing what Stern will say when he feels like being in charge again. He didn’t use these harsh words back in July or August when people were actually watching, he waits until the NBA is slipping down he relevancy pole to create an interest in his sport.

The fact of the matter is the lockout has a good couple more weeks before the real panic of missing a season can begin. It’s September 28th and although it’s unnerving a deal isn’t done yet, that’s all it is. All that has been gashed is meaningless preseason games no one cares about.

Stern seems to want this lockout to end in the glorious and parade worthy fashion the NFL lockout ended but his sport isn’t as popular as that sport. Not as many people play fantasy basketball as they do football and not as many people fill NBA stadiums as they do NFL ones.

The players and owners had their chance to have a glorious and well covered ending to this lockout back in August. Now they’re just moving further apart and hurting both sides in the process. The end of the NBA lockout will be a like a joke a comedian takes too far where at first it’s great and interesting but it ends up just being a cricket-worthy dud.

This is how the NBA Lockout will end: It leads into SportsCenter, they talk about it for 5-10 minutes top then move on to the Patriots-whoever highlights and never return to the story except for maybe a line or two of mention.

Congratulations basketball, you’ve officially even bored the interest of your one shareholder in ESPN. You think the Turner Network is hurting without you? They have the baseball playoffs coming up.You think local markets are hurting? Ha! Not only do they have their local NFL teams but they have a little thing called college football that runs until January. After that, local stations have something called the NHL to broadcast.

This Lockout is turning into a joke and it needs to end. The two sides meeting all this week and weekend is nice, but it’s a necessity it’s not progress.