I May Be Wrong But I Doubt It - Charles Barkley [60]
The owners say they don’t want it. They say that they prefer not having these high school kids and the guys who play maybe one year in college in the draft. But most owners do want it. Why? Because it’s an effective way to keep salaries down long term. Teams can let some high-priced veteran go, but keep a kid who for three years is making chump change comparatively because of the current collective bargaining agreement that has predetermined his salary. And in most cases, that kid can’t become a good enough player sitting on the bench to make the maximum after three years. As good as Jermaine O’Neal is now, he’s an excellent example of what I’m talking about. He wasn’t good enough after his first contract to sign for the maximum because he’d been sitting on the bench in Portland for four years. So he signs a contract, he’s tied up in his second contract for six or seven years, making money based on what he had shown in Portland, which wasn’t much. So now he’s behind the earning curve. For some guys, that translates into making $5 million a year instead of $9 million or $11 million, which is why I believe despite what they say a lot of owners are in favor of letting these high school kids come into the league. They’re saving money. That’s how you make it so fewer guys will make the maximum amounts allowed by the bargaining agreement.
It’s not like every owner is making all his decisions based on trying to win a championship. I’m serious about this; there are only about five or six teams that are seriously trying to win a championship every year. The rest of ’em keep recycling young guys they get in the lottery every year, then they keep letting ’em go just when they become eligible for big contracts. The Clippers are the best example of that in the NBA. They’ve perfected it. They get these guys relatively cheap in the draft, take all that season ticket money while the guys are young and developing, then when it’s time to pay these guys and put a decent team on the floor, the Clippers let ’em go. Just look at the players they’ve gotten rid of just when those guys have gotten to be good players, as far back as World B. Free, Tom Chambers and Terry Cummings. Every time it’s time for them to pay somebody big money and really start to build a team, they let him go. They get back in the lottery, get some new hope through the draft, and the fans don’t know, they’re getting all excited. Let’s see what the Clippers do now. They’ve got a chance to pay Elton Brand, Lamar Odom and Michael Olowokandi. Two of them, I believe, will wind up being let go by the Clippers.
I think players always underestimate how smart and how savvy the owners are about money and about business in general. They’re megamillionaires for a reason. When we had those meetings before the management lockout of labor in 1999, which led the league to cancel half the season, I said, “Hey guys, we’re going to lose. Those guys are billionaires. We’re millionaires. They’re smarter than we are on monetary issues.” I told ’em, “We’re gonna have guys killing themselves before they can outlast the owners.” And there we were a few weeks later, could have had the same deal we wound up taking without losing three months’ pay. Hell, we probably could have gotten that deal two years earlier.
People have been made to think these owners have to win to make money, that all they’re concerned about is winning. Don’t believe that. They’re making money without winning, which is why they’re