UPDATE 4:58 pm: Union VP Roger Mason Jr. — he of “how u” fame — has confirmed that talks will resume on Saturday, according to a tweet from Chris Manix of Sports Illustrated.
Mason was also ringing the “union is unified” bell loud in every interview today. He says there was no real divide there. He said there is still a big divide between the owners and players.
But the are talking again. We’ll see if it amounts to anything.
11:33 am: We’ll see if this follows the pattern of previous negotiations — a few days of long hours, intense negotiations followed by a hostile breakup and saying there is no deal — but at least they are talking again.
The NBA owners and players union are set to resume negotiations Saturday in New York, reports the Boston Herald.
As this is not from the usual suspects covering the lockout intently (guys doing insanely good work, by the way) take the report with a grain of salt. But it is expected the two sides would start talking again soon, so this fits.
The meeting will come two days after Thursday’s meeting of union brass where they will formulate a plan and try to get everyone back on the same page after some splintering in recent days.
There remain two key issues keeping a deal from being reached, and they are intertwined. One is the split of basketball related income (BRI), the revenue that comes into the league. The owners want a 50/50 split (after their expenses are taken out) the players are at 52.5 percent (down from 57 percent in the last labor deal). The other issues are “system issues” such as if teams paying the luxury tax can use the mid-level exception or do sign-and-trade deals.
The players have thought if they gave on some system issues the owners would come up on the percentage of BRI, they want to trade one for the other. The owners have maintained they need both for both financial reasons and to have a more competitive league. Both sides have dug in and are not moving.
Still, both sides say they are about 95 percent of the way to a deal. We’ll see if they can push it over the finish line with one last drive starting Saturday.