Originally posted by RishikeshA:
The Players own the sport. There will be enough money from players to own the franchises sooner than you think.
If the players are getting paid a lot more $$, the owners are making a hell of a lot more $$ and the franchises as a result are going up in value. Look how much the Clippers went for. If we get to the point where the top players are making $100 million a year, franchises will be going for $3 or $4 billion and more.
Nothing ever happens in a vaccuum and no player will ever compete financially with Steve Ballmer(net worth of $48 billion) or Rogers and Bell Canada, the owners of the Raptors(total market cap of $80 billion).
We just had the two most expensive rosters to ever make the Finals with both teams with deep-pocketed ownership groups and heavily into the luxury tax. We've also seen what it looks like when teams try to run on a shoestring budget(Charlotte, Phoenix) and its not pretty.
Robert Sarver is worth hundreds of millions of dollar, wealthy by usual standards but he is NBA poor when it comes to the other owners. How is he going to compete with owners who think nothing of dropping $150 million a year just in luxury tax payments? The same goes for Michael Jordan who just let Kemba Walker walker away to avoid the luxury tax. He's super wealthy by usual standards, poor by NBA owner standards.
I don't see that gap between players and owners narrowing anytime soon.
