Short Season

LeBron James, Picture Courtesy of CBSSports

In 2011-12, the NBA had trouble with keeping the season from going into a big crisis. It seemed as though, the NBAPA was not happy and the owners fell in line with being disappointed also. There was a struggle with trying to get contracts with the CBA on one accord and it took away some of the product that reached what we see today. This crisis seemed to not bother players actually as much as they thought. Why didn't it bother the players as much?... 2 words... Shorter season. Those players that were under contract were already in good status because the new CBA would not affect them in any way. The players that didn't have contracts needed to find out what was going to take place for their future.

Having to make a decision based off of not knowing is always a tough situation. The idea is to get everything needed in your favor, so when the options come around you can make a decision before others make a decision for you. This forced a lot of players to make a move to different borders so that they could earn some income immediately. Players would even negotiate that if things work back out in a timely fashion that they would return to the states to play in the NBA, no matter what the overseas contract stated.

LeBron James has been making a lot of noise lately with the different decisions that he has made and I guess we can't expect anything less from the genius himself. He has found ways to explore different venture and express his concerns with league. "Not sure if anybody is paying attention, but it sounds like he's getting ready for ownership". LeBron has been named the most powerful athlete in the world for the 2013-14 and it looks as though, he's taking that power and using it for some good.

LeBron recently stated that he would like the season to be shorter. How much shorter, you ask? How about a model like the 66 games that were played during the shortened season of "11-12". Now why would LeBron want a shorter season? Product control seems to be the idea of that. The idea is to be able to keep the high elite talent on the floor without damaging the image of the league. You definitely want to be able to give cities the opportunities to see their favorite players but you also want to be able to have quality product. Players lately have been taking off games because of their injuries, personal issues or just because of the fact the coaches want it to get that team ready for the playoffs.

The decision does fall in the hands of the owners and there is no telling what will happen but I'm definitely interested in seeing a product that's as perfect as possible. Nobody wants to continue to watch boring games with back up players in. The league will also be testing out a new theory of a 44 minute game. LeBron states that it's not about the minutes of the game because more minutes provides the opportunity for a game to be interesting but there is not reason to shorten a game. CJ McCullom stated that if they shorten the time, it would take away from the product and hurt the brand. The reason is because the role for the role players would decrease which hurts the time that players would be able to play on the floor.

There is no telling where the NBA game is going, but it seems like everybody has so many ideas, especially with the Silver at the top and the changes of the teams and owners. The players are really interested in making a difference for the better but I guess it's best to just watch them try and work things out.