The NBA and the players’ union have reached an agreement for the league’s new collective agreement, according to US media. Both parties brought the negotiations to a successful conclusion in the early hours of Saturday, a few hours before the deadline closed, on the horn. A new document that will enter into force next season and that will last until 2030thus scaring away all the ghosts of a possible ‘lockout’, a lockout, a strike, like the one that already happened in 2011 and that forced the start of the competition to be delayed for several months (that campaign only had 66 regular season games in instead of the usual 82).
The agreement, a sea of numbers where the key elements are television contracts, income from the exploitation of the competition and the salary limit of the franchises, nevertheless brings two most striking novelties: marijuana use It will be legal during the competition (there will be no controls on the players) and in November, at a neutral venue, a European basketball-style cup tournament will be played, such as the Copa del Rey in Spain (one-game playoffs).
Allowing the consumption of marijuana, although the headline would be impressive in any other sports competition on the planet, it is not so in the NBA. In fact, it is the end of a path that the league and the union have followed for years, one more example of their spirit as a progressive league and with a strong political character.
Inspections for cannabis use were already very lax (a player who gave three positives in four annual controls was penalized with five games) and even athletes spoke openly about their use in press conferences and interviews. Kevin Durant (Phoenix Suns), one of the top stars of the competition, has a sponsorship contract with a company, Weedmaps, which promotes the use of the substance in professional sports.
The NBA, being a closed circuit, is oblivious to all the laws established by the World Anti-Doping Agency (AMA), which includes marijuana as a prohibited substance (although also with increasingly lower penalties), and that is why it can make these types of decisions unilaterally.
But without a doubt, the great novelty is that there will be a nba cupa new tournament that will be played in November and that will copy the model of the European basketball cups, that is, a game until there is only one king of the hill left.
The teams will be divided into groups during the regular season and of them, eight shields will play the final phase in a neutral city (Las Vegas, which has longed for an NBA franchise for years, appears on the horizon as the venue). In addition, the champions will have a cash prize, all to provide a competitive fang to the first months of competition, which are usually the most leaden in terms of tension.
Finally, one of the rules that had all the ballots to be abolished will be maintained at least until the end of the decade. The players will have to play at least one year in the university league (NCAA) before making the jump to the NBA, something that a few years ago was very common, as in the cases of great league legends such as Kobe Bryant or LeBron James, who made the big leap when they just came of age. From today until 2030, you will have to be 19 years old.