O NBA, NBA, wherefore art thou NBA?

The NBA lockout is now over 90 days old and seemingly has no end to it. With the scheduled season tip-off looming in the distance, the players are still spread out across the world playing in various international and local leagues.

During the recent NFL lockout, ESPN and sports networks would update us almost every day on how talks were going, and whether or not an end was near; this is not the case with the NBA lockout.

My theory on this is it’s because there just is no telling whether or not the NBA and its players will ever come to an agreement. You see, the NBA is just so screwed up compared to the NFL. The NFL was fighting for things like rookie salary caps, HGH testing, how high the salary cap should be, how much money should go to the players, and other items on the agenda that would better their business model.

The NBA’s previous business model is so messed up that their new collective bargaining agreement is going to involve a whole new plan, assuming they come to the appropriate agreement.

The main problem that the NBA is trying to fix is the fact that only so many teams are making a profit each year in the league. For instance, after last season ended, it was reported that only eight teams in the league recorded a profit for the season.

How can this be? This means that 22 out of 30 teams in the league either broke even or lost money for running a professional basketball team in the NBA. If less than 25 percent of the teams are making money, there has got to be something wrong with the business model in place.

Locally, we know the Kings did not make money last year and have likely recorded losses the last couple of years at least. The Kings had such a low payroll on its roster that they had to trade for Marquis Daniels, a player that was out for the rest of the season due to injury. They traded for Daniels just for his expensive contract so they’d get over the minimum salary cap to avoid being taxed by the league.

ESPN’s columnist Bill Simmons said it best. In the system now, small-market teams have to do almost everything right in the front office (draft, sign free agents, re-sign players, etc.) in order to have a chance to compete with big-market teams.

The Sacramento Kings, along with other small-market teams, just cannot compete with these big-market teams because of the money situation. The big-market teams are the ones recording profits, therefore they have more money to spend on the players. This whole problem can be solved by one solution, but it is being shot down by greed.

The NBA needs to reach an agreement to share the revenue of the owners amongst the various teams. Although I understand the eight owners that are recording profits won’t want to, but those eight owners also need to realize that they need the other 22 teams to have a NBA.

Besides, can you imagine an NBA in which it wasn’t the same teams in the playoffs every year? It would be great seeing these small-market teams challenging for a championship. Just look at how excited every has gotten with the Oklahoma City Thunder’s success over the last five years.

The NBA and its players need to end this lockout and make sure they get the business model correct this time, as it is losing ground on the NFL in fandom.