72-Game NBA Season Proposed By Team Owners, Players Left To Accept It

NBA Commissioner David Stern and team owners have proposed a 72-game season to players that will start on December 15 but only if the players union accepts their newest proposal.

If the players union refuses the plan Stern says a far more harsh offer will be made.

When asked if players will accept the new offer Stern revealed:

“I would not presume to project or predict what the union would do … I can hope, and my hope is that the events of next week will lead us to a 72-game schedule starting on Dec. 15.”

The league presented the new offer to players after an 11 hour bargaining marathon on Thursday however union president Derek Fisher said the current proposal doesn’t address every player concern.

“It does not meet us entirely on the system issues that we felt were extremely important to try and close this thing out, and so at this point we’ve decided to end things for now, take a step back,” Fisher said. “We’ll go back as an executive committee, as a board, confer with our player reps and additional players over the next few days. Then we’ll make decisions about what our next steps will be at that point.”

Providing some finality to their bargaining David Stern said:

“There comes a time when you have to be through negotiating, and we are.”

If the player’s union doesn’t accept the new deal they will be offered a 53-47 split of revenues (player’s would receive 47%), a flex cap with a hard ceiling and salary rollbacks, all which would potentially cost NBA players millions of dollars per year in salary potential.

Do you think the players need to bow out now and accept the current deal?