On the TunneySide of Sports July 8, 2019, #751 Free Agent FRENZY!
After further review… A National Basketball Association (NBA) report recently indicated that some two hundred, yep, that’s 200, players this year have the option for free agency! That may not have been what Curt Flood had in mind on November 24, 1969 when he went to New York City to meet with Marvin Miller, then Executive Director of the Major League Baseball Players Association (MLBPA), as it was called. Flood said he was going to sue major league baseball.
“No one is going to own me,” said Flood to Miller. “I demand my rights,’ Flood continued. Miller knew that if Flood won it would change the way professional teams would retain their players – and it did! Free agency has grown dramatically in the last 50 years in all professional sports.
Perhaps your favorite player is one of the 200 mentioned above and you may or may not agree with his choice of free agency and the T*E*A*M to which he is planning to join. This is not about who is right or wrong or where he goes, it is more about the massive movement that was created by free agency. A professional coach told me that in his opinion many players who chose free agency soon regretted they did. Their better choice, he said, was to re-negotiate with his original team. However, there are many reasons for choosing free agency.
One that happened a few years ago was when LeBron James, then of the Cleveland Cavaliers, said he was “taking my talents to South Beach” presumably to join other players who would also opt for free agency and create a franchise to dominate the NBA and win championships, which it did with James, Wade, and Bosh. KD and Irving are planning that with the Nets.
Free agency has morphed NBA teams into more “business” than “sport.” Well, you say, it IS a business. Could it be as successful without the money coming from television and marketing resources if players remained with the team that drafted them? The frenzy that is occurring in today’s game has fans confused.
Certainly, the fans of each franchise want –no, demand – a championship this season! Instant gratification in vogue today insists on an immediate championship. None of the “wait-till-next-year” business. No more building a team mode. It’s gotta be now! Or maybe never.
Will you log-in your opinion on the value of free agency?
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