J.J. Redick will have none of Adam Silver's 'competitive balance' discussion
Seemingly in response to NBA commissioner Adam Silver’s recent comments on so-called super-teams at the NBA’s Board of Governors meeting in Las Vegas, Los Angeles Clippers guard J.J. Redick fired off a few tweets from a player’s perspective on the notion of restricting player movement.
In essence, Redick doesn’t like the NBA meddling in players’ freedom.
Since Miami formed their “superteam” in '10 there have been 5 different champs in 6 seasons. All this complaining about comp balance is ????.
— JJ Redick (@JJRedick) July 14, 2016
Boston formed a “superteam” in '08 but did thru trades. Ok for teams to group greats 2gether but not for players to decide to do that?
— JJ Redick (@JJRedick) July 14, 2016
Players should have freedom to decide where they want to play. Period.
— JJ Redick (@JJRedick) July 14, 2016
These are all salient points, and the first is one Silver also made during his extensive media session.
“In terms of so-called competitive balance, we’ve had five years of now this collective bargaining agreement, going into the sixth year, and we’ve had four different teams win over the last five years, so I view that very positive from a competitive balance standpoint,” Silver told reporters at Las Vegas Summer League on Tuesday. “I don’t necessarily want to overreact to a particular situation.”
At the same rate, Silver also said of 2014 NBA MVP Kevin Durant joining a Golden State Warriors team that already features three other All-NBA players — including two-time reigning MVP Stephen Curry — in addition to winning an NBA-record 73 regular-season games this past year and nearly repeated as NBA champions: “But just to be absolutely clear, I do not think that’s ideal from a league standpoint.”
Accordingly, Silver suggested he would look into “corrections we believe we can make in the system,” which makes Redick’s second and third points all the more interesting, considering both the owners and players’ union could potentially opt out of the current collective bargaining agreement in 2017.
[Follow Dunks Don’t Lie on Tumblr: The best slams from all of basketball]
So, if, as Redick suggests, the players are unwilling to bend on their freedom to sign wherever they choose in free agency, especially since teams can create super-teams via other means, as the Celtics did through trades in 2008, and the league insists on limiting that freedom, something’s gotta give.
While one might think a player from another would-be Western Conference contender could possibly be bitter enough about Golden State’s good fortune to align with Silver’s thinking on curbing super-team powers, that’s certainly not the case with Redick, and players league-wide will probably prioritize their future freedom in free agency over any perceived competitive imbalance, even if the Warriors stomp them this season. Let’s just hope it doesn’t translate into another work stoppage.
Dallas Mavericks owner Mark Cuban offers hope in this regard, telling ESPN.com’s Tim McMahon he actually believes the so-called Super Warriors could ultimately benefit the league’s bottom line. “They become the villain,” said Cuban. “Just like when LeBron [James] went to Miami, I loved that there was a villain. They become the villain. I’m fine with that. Everybody’s going to root for them to lose.”
Now, it’s only a matter of everyone else agreeing with a Duke alum and a “Shark Tank” host.
– – – – – – –
Ben Rohrbach is a contributor for Ball Don’t Lie and Shutdown Corner on Yahoo Sports. Have a tip? Email him at [email protected] or follow him on Twitter! Follow @brohrbach
