NBA Off-Season Discussion Thread

  • Welcome to "The New" Wrestling Smarks Forum!

    I see that you are not currently registered on our forum. It only takes a second, and you can even login with your Facebook! If you would like to register now, pease click here: Register

    Once registered please introduce yourself in our introduction thread which can be found here: Introduction Board


PHX

Legacy Member
Joined
Dec 3, 2010
Messages
23,705
Reaction score
402
Points
83
Age
36
Location
Phoenix, AZ
Favorite Wrestler
cmpunk2
Favorite Wrestler
adamcole2
Favorite Wrestler
ajstyles2
Favorite Wrestler
braywyatt
Favorite Wrestler
dx
Favorite Wrestler
samoajoe
Favorite Sports Team
n1QhWSb
Favorite Sports Team
osX2DVG
God people are so stupid for the things they try and sue people for nowadays.
 

Baller

Member
Joined
Jun 1, 2010
Messages
849
Reaction score
0
Points
16
I didnt even know you can sue for something like that. USA!
 

Kiffy Lube

Girls Just Wanna Have Fun
Joined
Jun 25, 2011
Messages
80,150
Reaction score
13,528
Points
248
Age
36
Location
The Large House, Arizona
Favorite Wrestler
lowki
Favorite Wrestler
lowki
Favorite Wrestler
lowki
Favorite Wrestler
lowki
Favorite Wrestler
lowki
Favorite Wrestler
lowki
Carmelo looks pretty ridiculous there.
 

Kairi

Active Member
Joined
Dec 3, 2010
Messages
6,483
Reaction score
2
Points
38
NBA Lockout Will Cost Networks BillionsPro hoops debacle could be a disaster for ESPN, TNT By Anthony Crupi


Minutes after the NBA officially announced the July 1 lockout, Sacramento Kings forward/center DeMarcus Cousins offered what was perhaps the most cogent, and funny, take on the players’ financial prospects. In a tweet posted Thursday at around 7:30 p.m. EDT, the big man asked, “Is Walmart hiring?”

Cousins has $3.37 million in salary at stake, so it’s understandable that he’s a bit antsy about his personal finances. Should the NBA season be scuttled altogether, however, billions of dollars would be washed away, and no one will take a bigger hit than the league’s network of TV partners.


billion in ad sales revenue if the labor dispute negates the entire 2011-12 NBA campaign. Indeed, the NBA audience has become so valuable that the postseason inventory alone accounts for nearly a fifth of the full-season take.

According to Kantar Media, ESPN/ABC and TNT took in $417.7 million in total ad sales revenue over the course of the 2010 NBA playoffs and finals. The going rate for a 30-second spot in the Celtics-Lakers series: $402,000 a pop.

If the networks stand to lose a fortune in ad dollars, the league itself risks billions in media rights, ticket sales, and merchandising. ESPN/ABC pays $485 million per year for the rights to air NBA games while TNT forks over $445 million.

Adding up to a cool $930 million per season, both TV contracts expire in 2016.

With ad sales brokered by Turner Sports, the league-owned NBA TV platform takes in approximately $50 million in sponsor dollars. Also at risk are the regional sports networks that carry NBA action, including the Fox Sports Nets and New York powerhouses YES Network (home to the New Jersey Nets) and MSG (Knicks).

League sponsors will need to scramble to make up for the diminished brand exposure. Last year, the Spanish financial giant BBVA Group signed a four-year, $100 million deal with the league, making it the official bank of the NBA. Bacardi, State Farm, and American Express are also marquee NBA sponsors.

As is the case with the NFL, the pro hoops dustup is largely about money. In April, NBA commissioner David Stern claims the league was on track to lose $300 million this season; as such, the owners want to reapportion the split of revenue between the franchises and players.

“The expiring collective bargaining agreement created a broken system that produced huge financial losses for our teams,” said NBA deputy commissioner Adam Silver. “We need a sustainable business model that allows all 30 teams to be able to compete for a championship, fairly compensates our players, and provides teams, if well-managed, with an opportunity to be profitable.”

The NBA has locked out players before, most recently during the 1998-99 season. That dispute cleaved the schedule to 50 games and soured millions of fans. It took three years before TV ratings returned to prelockout levels.
 

No More Sorrow

Well-Known Member
Joined
Jun 28, 2011
Messages
8,942
Reaction score
41
Points
48
Age
33
Location
Connecticut
MLB has to love this, both the NFL and NBA are in lockouts, they have such a good oppertunity right now.

And between the NBA's and NFL's lockout, the NBA's lockout is more likely to go into the regular season, at least the NFL has been talking and are likely to get a deal done before pre-season starts, i can't imagine the NBA being as fourtnate, they have way more issues to deal with than the NFL, kinda makes the NFL's lockout look like nothing.

But whenever they get a deal done, even if it takes up some of the regular season it's not gonna change how i feel about the sport. I'm still going to watch every game even if it's a shortened season.
 

Kairi

Active Member
Joined
Dec 3, 2010
Messages
6,483
Reaction score
2
Points
38
LALA-articleLarge.jpg


AS she was finishing lunch at the R Lounge overlooking Times Square recently, La La Anthony craned her neck and motioned toward the back of the room, over the head of her lunch guest, projectile whispering, “Just give me one second, O.K.!”


Enlarge This Image
http://javascript<b></b>:pop_me_up2...27,scrollbars=yes,toolbars=no,resizable=yes')
Damon Winter/The New York Times

At a Planet Hollywood event.



“Sorry,” she said, returning to her immediate company. “My financial guy is here for our meeting when you and I are done.”

“I’ll tell you a quick thing,” she added, leaning in conspiratorially, causing her vintage gold-hoop earrings to lurch forward. “He’s the one who got 50 Cent in that Vitaminwater deal. So any time he wants to meet with me, I’m like,” she clapped once and laughed, “I’m available!”

To be fair, Mrs. Anthony, the wife of the basketball player Carmelo Anthony, is seemingly available for anything these days. Since her husband’s blockbuster trade to the New York Knicks from the Denver Nuggets in February, the couple has been popping up everywhere: “The View,” “The Wendy Williams Show,” the White House Correspondents’ Dinner. Every stage of their apartment hunt was reported by Page Six, as was Mr. Anthony’s recent helicopter ride to Southampton, N.Y., from Manhattan for dinner at Nobu.
Such is life as “the first couple of the N.B.A.,” a term Mrs. Anthony laughs off, though only after bringing it up.

Given their combined star power, good looks and obvious ambition, the question must be asked: Are Mr. and Mrs. Anthony campaigning to be the next Posh and Becks (Victoria and David Beckham)? Or perhaps a family-friendly version of Khloe Kardashian and Lamar Odom?

Mrs. Anthony, born Alani Vazquez, a beauty with large brown eyes, full cheeks and a girl-next-door sweetness, prefers another comparison.
“I love Will Smith and Jada Pinkett,” she said earlier in the lunch, sipping iced tea with lemon. “You see the love, and you can see the support, and they partner on things and produce together. But she has a life, and he has a life.”

IF the formula for power-couple success is fame times two plus business savvy, the Anthonys would seem to have the right answer. In 2008, the couple established Krossover Productions, the name suggesting a melding of their two careers. That same year, the company produced “Tyson,” the critically praised Mike Tyson documentary. It currently co-produces Mrs. Anthony’s reality show on VH1, known as “La La’s Full Court Wedding,” in its first season. (It will become “La La’s Full Court Life” when it returns on Aug. 22.)

Other projects in the pipeline at Krossover include a movie with the director Brett Ratner (“Rush Hour,” “X-Men: The Last Stand”), more reality programming for VH1 and a children’s book about bullying.

But the record is spotty for New York sports couples trying to transcend their genres, particularly for the wives. For every Nancy Seaver — so beloved in New York after her husband, Tom, led the Mets to the World Series in 1969 that she appeared beside him in the Macy’s Thanksgiving Day parade and in commercials for Phillips 66 — there is at least one Joumana Kidd, whose hosting career (“Extra,” NBA Television) dissolved amid a messy divorce from the former New Jersey Nets point guard Jason Kidd. Then there was Anna Benson, the men’s magazine model whose bawdy attempts to stay in the spotlight helped get her husband, the pitcher Kris Benson, traded from the Mets in 2006.

Still, Mr. Anthony said, converting their marriage into a business partnership simply made sense. Both he and his wife are innately ambitious people who are not eager to let others hold the puppet or purse strings.
“I saw her wanting to go into movies and producing films and documentaries and reality shows,” Mr. Anthony said in a telephone interview, “so I said instead of letting somebody else come on board and produce all this stuff, we have the capabilities and the relationships, we can create our own production company and bring everything through that.” Asked whether the chance to build an off-court career figured into his plans to come to New York, Mr. Anthony, 27, a Brooklyn native, said he simply wanted to come home. “I’d always imagined playing as a New York Knick at the Garden,” he said.

For Mrs. Anthony, 32, controlling her own career becomes both easier and more complex as she is increasingly identified as her husband’s wife. She was previously best known as the host of MTV’s “TRL” from 2002 to 2007, as well as from her appearances on “Keeping Up With the Kardashians” and “Flavor of Love” (as a host, not a contestant). Before that she was a radio D.J. in Atlanta and Los Angeles, a career she said she conned her way into during high school. “I lied about my age, because I was too young to do it at the time,” she said.

She was born in Brooklyn, like her husband, but raised in New Jersey and Atlanta. On this afternoon in May, she was looking feminine and tough in a Topshop blazer, cargo pants and Christian Louboutin Daffodil pumps.

Enlarge This Image
http://javascript<b></b>:pop_me_up2...30,scrollbars=yes,toolbars=no,resizable=yes')
With her husband, Carmelo Anthony, in May.

Related

Enlarge This Image
http://javascript<b></b>:pop_me_up2...30,scrollbars=yes,toolbars=no,resizable=yes')
The couple in 2010.

Enlarge This Image
http://javascript<b></b>:pop_me_up2...62,scrollbars=yes,toolbars=no,resizable=yes')
With their son, Kiyan, in 2010.



She narrowed her eyes, recounting the story of how Mr. Anthony first tried to woo her in a New York club, sending over a bottle of Moët & Chandon. “I thought it was so lame,” she said. “He was like, ‘What are you doing after the club?’ I’m like: ‘After the club? It’s 2 a.m. I’m going home. What are you doing after the club?’ ”

Stealing (or, at least, sharing) the spotlight comes naturally to Mrs. Anthony. As a teenage intern at Atlanta’s Hot 97.5 in the mid-1990s, she attracted the attention of the D.J.’s by being “young and in the demo,” referring to the demographic, as well as witty and quick with a comeback, said Ryan Cameron, then the host of the station’s morning show.
“La La just had that kind of personality,” he said. “They would ask her questions” on the show, “and she became popular” with audiences. So popular, in fact, that the D.J.’s eventually implored Mr. Cameron to “make her stop talking.”
“It was an ego thing” for the D.J.’s, he said. “They gave her the rope, and she ran with it.”

When a fellow intern, Christopher Bridges (now known as the rapper Ludacris), was given his own show, the then-Ms. Vazquez was brought on as his female cohort. After Mr. Bridges left to start his rap career, she sent her audition tape to stations across the country, eventually landing at 100.3 The Beat in Los Angeles. Before long, MTV came calling.
For Mrs. Anthony, who married Mr. Anthony in July 2010, the role of an N.B.A. wife and mother (their son, Kiyan, is 4) has proved restraining at times. On “The Wendy Williams Show” in March, Mrs. Anthony jokingly complained that none of the Knicks wives had introduced themselves to her yet, eliciting cries of “get over yourself” from some gossip blogs. A YouTube video shows her being angrily escorted out of a Mavericks game in 2009 after scrapping with rowdy fans who had heckled her.

Mrs. Anthony has learned, she said, not to express herself too frankly, or to cheer too loudly at other teams’ arenas. The tricky part is doing that without losing the spark that makes her La La.
“A lot of times with basketball players, their wives, and I’m not criticizing, but their life is just about the man,” she said, mostly ignoring four mini lobster rolls. “What time is he getting home, why hasn’t he called me?”
“But I’m so much more than” that, she said. “I’m a mom, I’m an actress, I’m a producer. Like, out of all that, I don’t want to just be called a basketball wife.” Hence, her refusal to appear alongside Shaunie O’Neal and Evelyn Lozada on the VH1 show “Basketball Wives,” she said.
“What I see in Will Smith and Jada Pinkett,” she said, returning to her role models, “is having your own, and I tell everyone that.”
Mr. Anthony isn’t so sure.

“Will and Jada have a tremendous relationship,” he said. “Jay-Z and Beyoncé have a tremendous relationship, Swizz Beatz and Alicia Keys, they’re a couple we see that inspire us.
“But we want to be ourselves. We want people to say, ‘We want our relationship to be like Melo and La La.’ ”
 

Kairi

Active Member
Joined
Dec 3, 2010
Messages
6,483
Reaction score
2
Points
38
Timberwolves F Kevin Love & Clippers F Blake Griffin Show Some Lockout Humor <!-- / icon and title --><!-- message -->
<table id="ncode_imageresizer_warning_1" class="ncode_imageresizer_warning" width="480"><tbody><tr><td class="td1" width="20"> </td><td class="td2" unselectable="on">This image has been resized. Click this bar to view the full image. The original image is sized 575x431 and weights 52KB.</td></tr></tbody></table>
Blake Griffin and Kevin Love are really locked up over the lockout… yeah, corny I know. BUT, the NBA lockout is only in it’s first week. Will the guys be as jovial if November rolls around, still no closer on a deal and no paycheck either? I know I won’t be happy. Le sigh.
photo via Twitter
 

Kiffy Lube

Girls Just Wanna Have Fun
Joined
Jun 25, 2011
Messages
80,150
Reaction score
13,528
Points
248
Age
36
Location
The Large House, Arizona
Favorite Wrestler
lowki
Favorite Wrestler
lowki
Favorite Wrestler
lowki
Favorite Wrestler
lowki
Favorite Wrestler
lowki
Favorite Wrestler
lowki
I tried reading some of that, but it didn't seem Basketball related at all other than she is married to Carmelo. Can you tell me what does that have to with the NBA?

E!-SPAN it's evolving.
 

SAIYANS

Well-Known Member
Joined
Dec 3, 2010
Messages
16,529
Reaction score
196
Points
63
Age
35
Favorite Wrestler
batista2
Favorite Wrestler
dx
Favorite Wrestler
johncena
Favorite Wrestler
therock
Favorite Wrestler
undertaker
Favorite Wrestler
trishstratus
Kobe vs Bow Wow and JD's son :lol: (spotted 10 when 11 wins lol)

[video=youtube;DTYF4G-5tvc]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DTYF4G-5tvc[/video]

This goes back to Bow Wow saying forget Kobe, its LeBron's time earlier this year on twitter and JD's son co-signing him. That right there is the real Kobe: "It's a lot different seeing a great white shark on the discovery channel and actually trying to swim with them motherfuckers" :lmao
 

Killswitch

Active Member
Joined
Sep 8, 2009
Messages
2,127
Reaction score
21
Points
38
Location
The "Winners" Circle
Timberwolves have finally fired Head Coach Kurt Rambis. Well done, Khan. Not that firing Rambis is wrong as the team is terrible, but making him wait this long when we've all known it was happening... KHAAAAAAAAAAN!!
 

SAL

Well-Known Member
Joined
Dec 3, 2010
Messages
3,826
Reaction score
64
Points
48
Location
BOSTON
Kobe vs Bow Wow and JD's son :lol: (spotted 10 when 11 wins lol)

[video=youtube;DTYF4G-5tvc]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DTYF4G-5tvc[/video]

This goes back to Bow Wow saying forget Kobe, its LeBron's time earlier this year on twitter and JD's son co-signing him. That right there is the real Kobe: "It's a lot different seeing a great white shark on the discovery channel and actually trying to swim with them motherfuckers" :lmao

Yay, Kobe beat a couple of kids. If LeBron did this exact same thing, you would (fill in the blank)
 

SAIYANS

Well-Known Member
Joined
Dec 3, 2010
Messages
16,529
Reaction score
196
Points
63
Age
35
Favorite Wrestler
batista2
Favorite Wrestler
dx
Favorite Wrestler
johncena
Favorite Wrestler
therock
Favorite Wrestler
undertaker
Favorite Wrestler
trishstratus
Yay, Kobe beat a couple of kids. If LeBron did this exact same thing, you would (fill in the blank)

Bow wow vid without all the JD shit - http://youtube.com/watch?v=4hDh2U1hVrw

Bow is going on 25, lol that is a kid?

JD's son is a high school kid and baller sure, but Bow Wow isn't. He just is a little shit talker and EBC player every now and then.

If LeBron did the same thing, we would have never seen it cause he would have had the tape confiscated like oh say a couple summers ago :p
 

SAIYANS

Well-Known Member
Joined
Dec 3, 2010
Messages
16,529
Reaction score
196
Points
63
Age
35
Favorite Wrestler
batista2
Favorite Wrestler
dx
Favorite Wrestler
johncena
Favorite Wrestler
therock
Favorite Wrestler
undertaker
Favorite Wrestler
trishstratus
NBA lockout ends when top stars go to China. They will pay the big bucks and have the audience. Kobe, Wade, LeBron, Dwight, and those guys make the jump and you will see the NBA come calling. Honestly players aren't going to rollback salaries, and they shouldn't have to when they have signed guaranteed deals and execs had the option to not fully guarantee them or make them incentive based in the last CBA. They will likely change contract length, make it a higher flex cap, give teams an amnesty or two to save a cap hit, and call it a day later on when the owners realize the top guys will go overseas and get paid while they get no tv or venue revenues and still have to pay the annual board of governors fee.

What I dont get is a point that Max Kellerman brought up, why is no one asking Stern to tale a pay cut, when he is the highest paid commisioner in all of sports?
 

Kairi

Active Member
Joined
Dec 3, 2010
Messages
6,483
Reaction score
2
Points
38
Shaquille O’Neal joining Turner Sports’ ‘Inside the NBA’ <!-- / icon and title --><!-- message -->
Just a few weeks after retirement from the NBA, Shaquille O’Neal is joining Atlanta-based Turner Sports as a full-time analyst for TNT’s “Inside the NBA” show.
“This was an easy decision,” O’Neal said in a phone conference. “It was the best fit for me.”
He chose TNT/Turner Sports over an ABC/ESPN offer.
“It was very tempting,” O’Neal said. “I have tremendous respect for ABC and ESPN. But Turner/TNT is the place for me.”
O’Neal has plenty of TV experience outside of basketball. For instance, he has done several reality shows, including “Shaq Vs.” on ABC, which lasted two seasons starting in 2009 and featured Shaq dabbling in different sports outside of basketball.
He isn’t worried about fitting in with Ernie Johnson, Charles Barkley and Kenny Smith. “There will be enough to go around for everybody,” said David Levy, who oversees sports for TNT. “Shaq’s insight will enhance the show.”
“Charles is a funny guy,” O’Neal added. “He’s a guy who says what’ s on his mind. I feel honored to be with him and Kenny. We’ll make it fun and more exciting for the fans to watch.”
The show is shot at Turner Studios in Midtown. For O’Neal, this is not a big deal. He’s own a residence in Atlanta for 15 years, he said.
The presumption, of course, in this situation is that there won’t be a lengthy NBA lockout.
“Hopefully, it doesn’t last long,” O’Neal said. “The only people who suffer in this lockout situation is the fans. It’s millionaires vs. billionaires. Hopefully, the powers that be have an intelligent conversation and have a constructive deal that doesn’t hurt the fans.”

Will he ever be tempted to go back to NBA? “One word: no,” he said.

O’Neal has shown interest in law enforcement, like Steven Seagal, but said for now, that idea is on ice.

Levy said there could be some executive producing opportunities for O’Neal perhaps in the animated division of Turner Entertainment. But there won’t be any return of “Kazaam,” his much maligned movie role.

” ‘Kazaam’ is back in the bottle, gone forever,” O’Neal said.
<!-- / message -->