Labor relations in basketball: The lockout of 1998-99

Monthly Labor Review

Volumn 122, Issue 4, 1999, Pages 3-9

  Staudohar, Paul D ^a  

^a CALIFORNIA STATE UNIVERSITY   (United States)

Author keywords

[No Author keywords available]

Indexed keywords

EID: 0008096199     PISSN: 00981818     EISSN: None     Source Type: Journal    
DOI: None     Document Type: Article

References (19)

1. There was a lockout of NBA referees by the league late in 1995 that lasted a month, but did not interrupt play because the league utilized replacement referees.
2. Roger G. Noll, "Professional Basketball: Economic and Business Perspectives," in Paul D. Staudohar and James A. Mangan, eds., The Business of Professional Sports (Urbana, IL, University of Illinois Press, 1991), p. 18.
3. This section is based on Paul D. Staudohar, Playing for Dollars: Labor Relations and the Sports Business (Ithaca, NY, Cornell University Press, 1996), pp. 123-26.
4. The football case is McNeil v. National Football League, 764 F. Supp. 1351 (1991).
5. See Paul D. Staudohar, "Baseball labor relations: the lockout of 1990," Monthly Labor Review, October 1990, pp. 32-36.
6. Stefan Fatsis, "NBA'S Problems Mount," The Wall Street Journal, Apr. 24, 1998, p. W9.
7. Andrew Peyton Thomas, "NBA: Nasty, Brutish Athletes," The Wall Street Journal, Nov. 24, 1998, p. 22.
8. The figures are from Bill Saporito, "Stars' Salaries: Swish," Time, July 29, 1996, p. 61.
9. Quoted in David Halberstam, "Jordan's Moment," The New Yorker, Dec. 21, 1998, p. 48.
10. Mark Heisler, "The Money Says This One's a Lock to Be Lockout in '98," Los Angeles Times, Nov. 9, 1997, p. C3.
11. While basketball had the first salary cap, a general cap now exists in football, and there is a cap on rookie salaries in hockey. For details, see Paul D. Staudohar, "Salary Caps in Professional Team Sports," Compensation and Working Conditions, spring 1998, pp. 3-11.
12. The problem of the average salary growing faster than the median salary has also occurred in baseball, due to the exceptionally high amounts paid to relatively few players. (See Paul D. Staudohar, "Baseball's Changing Salary Structure," Compensation and Working Conditions, fall 1997, pp. 2-9.)
13. Reported in The Wall Street Journal, Nov. 24, 1998, p. 22.
14. See Richard A. Walton and Robert B. McKersie, A Behavioral Theory of Labor Negotiations (Ithaca, NY, ILR Press [Cornell University], 1991).
15. "Free Ride," ESPN Magazine, Mar. 23, 1998, p. 173.
16. In the Matter of National Basketball Players Association and National Basketball Association, Oct. 19, 1998 (mimeographed).
17. Andrew Zimbalist, "Let the Market Rule the Basketball Court," The Wall Street Journal, Nov. 10, 1998, p. A22.
18. In 1997-98, the minimum salary was $242,000 for rookies and $272,500 for veterans.
19. Stefan Fatsis, "NBA, Players Reach Accord, Saving Season," The Wall Street Journal, Jan. 7, 1999, p. A3.