The NBA Money Grab

I've been away from the blog way too long. It hasn't been because of lack of opinions about stuff. You both know me too well to allow that excuse! I have an opinion on EVERYTHING. The fact is that we're trying to get our house on the market, so there's hardly a free moment if we're at home. The good news is that we're down in Virginia this weekend… and that means free time! On to the subject at hand…

I found this article by Adrian Wojnarowski to be an interesting one. I understand his main point, that the big stars drive the revenue for the NBA and therefore they are worth more than they are paid. But I also happen to disagree.

Let me start by saying that in the world of capitalism, there will forever be tension between owners and workers, or non-owners if you will. It's a timeless storyline of the "haves" vs. the "have nots". There is no Staples Easy button that will solve the conflict. It will always exist. But in this case, I admit that I lean toward the "haves".

The bulk of Wojnarowski's argument is that the income for NBA teams comes from the players, and therefore the players deserve whatever money that they demand. But if you applied that thinking to other businesses in America, then the guy working the cash register at 7-Eleven should be making $10 million a year. After all, if he wasn't running the store, selling the merchandise, and taking people's money, 7-Eleven wouldn't have any revenue, right? How about McDonald's? Does the fry guy deserve $5 million a year? And universities? We should be paying the professors millions, right? I mean, without them there would be no students, and no revenue.

On a more personnel level, this line of reasoning would mean that the generals and admirals would make far less than the privates, corporals, and sergeants on the front lines of the field of battle. In the military we call them "boots on ground". They are the ones that are doing the dirty work on the front lines. All the diplomacy in the world can't replace what they do. An E-1 makes less than $1500 a month. A congressman makes about $14,500 a month. Does that make sense? Should I demand from President Obama that I should make more money because he wouldn't be able to carry out his foreign policy without me? I could make that demand, but that's not reality.

So, do owners make a lot of money? Heck ya they do. They make buckets of money. But the fact is, they are OWNERS. If they don't own teams to make up a league known as the NBA that provides a place for basketball players to earn money playing, then the players wouldn't make a dime. In this system known as capitalism, we have wealthy people that own things like NBA teams and make a bunch of money. Having said that, I don't have a problem with labor negotiations, because it provides a balance to ensure that the workers are not abused. I have a hard time with people who make $20 million a year making an argument that owners are taking advantage of them.

In end I think it's a case of envy. NBA players see the NBA owners and see the money that they make, and in this nation of entitlement that we live in, they think that they should have all of that money instead of the owners. They are the "have nots" (although that's a stretch) and the owners are the "haves". But it's not like they don't have options. If they want to go play in Europe, then let them go play in Europe. They can make a lot of money there. The fact is that they know that they make the money that they do HERE because the NBA is the place where you play basketball if you are one of the best in the world. If there were five other leagues just like it, then they wouldn't make anywhere near what they make now. I think the players have to accept that to a certain degree.

And if we're so concerned about players being fairly compensated, why can't colleges pay their players? Whoops, that's a rabbit trail.

Looking over what I've written so far before I post it, I do realize that there is a flaw in my thinking, which is to say that the 7-Eleven clerk and the fry guy can be easily replaced. Kobe Bryant and LeBron James, not so much. But that opens up another point of discussion, one that I won't get into now: are the players bigger than the game of basketball? I personally think that fans of basketball would still watch it whether or not Kobe or LeBron took to the floor. They are not bigger than the game. I love McDonald's fries, not the guy who makes them.

Should James, Wade, and Bryant make $50 million a year? Nope. I don't think so.