Nature abhors a vacuum. So do news agencies, blogs (including us) and apparently agents.
So the fact that there has been no talk from the principles involved in a series of owner/player meetings — a six-hour meeting last week, a more than five hour meeting Wednesday and another planned for Thursday — has led to all sorts of speculation. Some optimistic, some negative, and some from people still looking for Billy Hunter’s head on a silver platter. All of it just filling the void. A lot of sound and fury signifying nothing.
Frankly, we don’t know. Not yet.
That said there is a more optimistic vibe of late. A feeling that at least the talks are serious and maybe some ground is being covered.
That said, lots of things are blowing up. Which includes a tweet that showed up on union vice president Roger Mason’s twitter Wednesday night.That abbreviated message was up about half an hour before Mason took it down and claimed his twitter account was hacked. Right. People gullible enough to send money to that poor Nigerian prince who keeps emailing are not buying that. Everyone who tweets something they don’t like says they were hacked. (Now, some people do get hacked, we just tend not to believe it.) Pretty soon Mason had these tweets up in response.
Today’s meetings were cordial and there is a pure since of urgency on both parts to end the lockout. However, there is still a HUGE gap..
Tomorrow we have more meetings and I’m hoping there is progress. Today’s meetings did nothing to make me feel more optimistic.
My guess, Mason was either texting or direct messaging someone on twitter and messed up (something not that hard to do from a phone program). That’s the consensus out there.
But that does mean we are really close to a deal? No.
And we should add that agents (used to being in the middle of negotiations involving their livelihood, they don’t like being on the sidelines) are showing more and more frustration with union director Billy Hunter. Many think he is without a plan. A number of agents wanted to go the aggressive, decertification route from July 1 and have been frustrated with Hunter’s more patient approach.
Now, decertification would be a scary thing for all involved. Sam Amick explains why at Sports Illustrated.The pressure is indeed building, but these last eight days have been good for the union head. Two small-group sessions featuring Hunter and Stern are already in the books, with another scheduled for Thursday and possibly another on Friday. Hunter will need to deliver results in the coming weeks or risk a mutiny, but the incremental progress has continued if only because the two sides are talking again…..
Decertification remains an option, no matter how tricky it might be, but the message sent by taking that route will have changed dramatically if that’s the path the players choose. On July 1, it would have been a punch-first strategy intended to help the union and the players gain a badly-needed edge. From here on out, it would be a clear indication that Hunter’s approval rating was at an all-time low and an almost-certain sign that the season would be lost.We’ve long said that by mid-September we’d see a sense of urgency and start to get a feel for where things really stand, if things are really that bleak. Well, we do see a sense of urgency. As for if things are looking up in the lockout, well, they are at least meeting. Stay tuned to see where things really stand in the next few weeks. And how Hunter acts may be the best indicator.