NBA to enter lockout over players' wages

The 2011/12 NBA season has been thrown into turmoil after a failure to agree on a new collective bargaining agreement gave way to a league lockout.

The NBA was slated to be locked out upon the expiry of the existing CBA at a minute after midnight Eastern Standard Time on Friday, after a three-hour meeting between players and team owners failed to bridge the gulf separating their demands.
The team owners are seeking to reduce the players' current 57% share of basketball revenue, and rejected the players' offer to peg that figure at 54.3%.
"It's obvious the lockout will happen tonight [Thursday]," said players' union chief Billy Hunter in quotes reported on www.nba.com.
"The problem is that there's such a gap in terms of the numbers, where they are and where we are, and we just can't find any way to bridge that gap."
NBA commissioner David Stern said there was a "philosophical divide" between the two parties, with the teams eager to avoid the financial losses that have hit many during the term of the most recent CBA, and the players anxious to preserve their huge salaries, which currently average US$5million a year.
The last time a lockout hit the NBA, in 1998/99, the season was reduced to a 50-game schedule, although Hunter is refusing to contemplate such an outcome at this stage.
"I hope it doesn't come down to that," he said.
"Obviously, the clock is now running with regard to whether or not there will or will be a loss of games, and so I'm hoping that over the next month or so that there will be sort of a softening on their side and maybe we have to soften our position as well."
The first impact of the lockout will be the cancellation of the start of the annual free-agency period, which was due to commence later on Friday.
The NBA's summer league has already has been called off, while some players' involvement in Olympic qualifiers this summer could be thrown into chaos without the input of the NBA over insurance matters.
Teams are also unable to have any contact with their players during the period of the lockout.
The announcement of the expected action means two of America's major leagues will be in a state of lockout. The NFL's team owners and players also failed to agree on a new CBA in March.