Collective bargaining talks produce vaguely positive outcome

The lockout drags on, but today NBA fans are given the slightest reason for optimism. Representatives for the NBA players and owners met today for a six-hour bargaining session, and though dialogue in itself isn’t enough to bring back the league we all know and love, the fact that meetings are going on at all does give some reason for optimism.

Howard Beck of the New York Times met reps from both sides on their way out, and offered a few carrots to basketball-starved fans via his Twitter account:

[Derek] Fisher also said parties agreed to dispense with the rhetoric and public shots at each other. All positive signs, IMHO.

Positive indeed. The less talking that goes on outside of the negotiations, the better. Neither side really has much need for posturing at this point; both sides have made their pleas to the public based on the supposed injustices of the other camp, and the patience for that kind of campaigning has grown thin. Fisher’s comments give us reason to believe that that stage in the lockout process has passed, which can only mean good things for the rest of the negotiations. Less bad blood, more hammering out the details of how to bring the NBA back.

More meetings are scheduled, but parties will not specify when and where.

The lack of public transparency in this case is a non-issue. Again, the important thing is that these meetings and dialogues continue to happen. Progress is the key here, even if fans and media members have some difficulty tracing the specific locale of each negotiation. It’s good news that there isn’t just “another meeting,” but another planned meeting that’s actually on the calendar.

Stern and Silver just spoke. Just as cautious as Fisher in assessing progress. But Stern said there is definitely time to make a deal.

The fact that neither side is jumping at a chance to declare real, immediate progress is just fine. It’s important that both parties continue to take the negotiations seriously and consider the timeline of the bargaining period to be pressing, and that sense of urgency doesn’t come without the acknowledgement that there’s still plenty of work to be done. It’d be wonderful if the lockout could be resolved overnight, but the gulf between the players and owners makes that an impossibility. As such, a healthy dose of realism is invaluable for all involved, and that such realism is embedded in the notion that there’s still plenty of negotiating work to be done.