NBA Lockout Update: Uh-Oh, Talks Break Off & No Further Meetings Planned

Posted by Sabrina B. @gametimegirl

NBA labor talks broke down Thursday after three days of meetings failed to yield a deal to end a 112-day lockout, raising the likelihood that even more games will be canceled in an already fractured season.

After 30 hours of negotiations before a federal mediator, the sides remained divided over two main issues — the division of revenues and the structure of the salary cap system.

“Ultimately, we were unable to bridge the gap that separates the two parties,” NBA deputy commissioner Adam Silver said. “We understand the ramifications of where we are. We’re saddened on behalf of the game.”

Union president Derek Fisher said players realized the ripple effect of the stalemate.

“This is not in any way about ego,” he said. “There are a lot of people’s livelihoods at stake separate from us.”

Without a deal, NBA commissioner David Stern likely will decide more games must be dropped.

The season was supposed to begin Nov. 1, but all games through Nov. 14 — 100 in total — have been scrapped, costing players about $170 million in salaries.

“Hopefully, we can get back to the table, but certainly a tough day, a very tough day,” said Peter Holt, the labor relations committee chair and owner of the San Antonio Spurs.

Previously each side had proposed receiving 53 percent of basketball-related income after players were guaranteed 57 percent under the previous collective bargaining agreement.

Silver said the league formally proposed a 50-50 revenue split Wednesday, and the union moved from 53 percent to 52.5 percent Thursday.

Asked whether the players would drop to 50 percent, Holt said he didn’t think it was that big of a jump but that the union did.

He said the league would not go above 50 percent “as of today. But never say never on anything.”

Stern has the flu and did not attend Thursday’s negotiating session.

Owners and players met with federal mediator George Cohen for 16 hours Tuesday, ending around 2 a.m. Wednesday, then returned just eight hours later and spent another 8½ hours in discussions. The sides then met for about five hours Thursday, before calling it quits.

Cohen said the two sides weren’t able to resolve the “strongly held, competing positions that separated them on core issues.”

“In these circumstances, after carefully reviewing all of the events that have transpired, it is the considered judgment of myself … that no useful purpose would be served by requesting the parties to continue the mediation process at this time,” Cohen said in a statement.

Though both sides have said they believe bargaining is the only route to a deal, the process could end up in the courts. Each brought an unfair labor practice charge against the other with the National Labor Relations Board, and the league also filed a federal lawsuit against the union attempting to block it from decertifying.

Union officials thus far have been opposed to decertification, a route the NFL players initially chose during their lockout.

But Hunter said Thursday that “all of our options are on the table. Everything.”

Also, while the sides haven’t agreed to anything, the owners have been open to accepting a $5 million mid-level exception, sources told ESPN’s Chris Broussard. That’s down from $5.8 million under the old agreement but up from the $3.4 million the owners had been offering.

In other business, the Board of Governors re-elected Minnesota Timberwolves owner Glen Taylor as its chairman and heard a presentation from New Jersey Nets owner Mikhail Prokhorov on the new Barclays Center in Brooklyn, which will become the Nets’ home for the 2012-13 season.

WRITTEN BY ESPN.com TrueHoop writer Henry Abbott, ESPN The Magazine senior NBA writer Chris Broussard and The Associated Press contributed to this report & FULL STORY HERE