Players Reject N.B.A.’s Offer and Opt to Disband Union
The union representing National Basketball Association players formally disbanded Monday and declared it would take its standoff with the league’s owners into federal court, a development that pushed the league as close as it has ever been to losing an entire season of play.
The players, no longer unionized, said they would file an antitrust lawsuit in the next two days and would seek a summary judgment declaring the league’s four-and-a-half -month lockout to be illegal. With negotiations effectively ended and legal proceedings about to intensify, a season that has already had six weeks of games canceled may never take place.
“We’re about to go into the nuclear winter of the N.B.A.,” Commissioner David Stern said darkly in an interview with ESPN.
Both sides are holding out. This NBA season may not happen. Who is going to suffer more? The players or the owners? Who looks the worst in this impasse?